Page 24 of View from Above

His scalp protested as the killer fisted a handful of his hair and pulled his upper body off the ground. Just as he’d threatened her, she wound her arm around his neck and squeezed. “Now, I don’t usually let the opinions of others concern me, but I’m willing to make an exception for you, Detective. I’m not a coward, and I’m nowhere close to finished with what I started.”

Payton clamped onto her grip and tried to pry himself free. In vain. Pressure built behind his sternum. His lungs screamed for relief, but it never came. He wrenched his shoulder forward to dislodge her leverage. She was stronger than she looked, and he was losing consciousness.

“Shhh, Detective,” she said. “This will all be over when you wake up.”

“Mallory.” He tried to hold on, but it was no use. The darkness had already pulled him under.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“Don’t look down. Don’t look down.” The words tore from her throat.

She was going to die.

Mallory clutched onto the ledge framing a massive three-pane window on the tenth floor of the building. She’d screamed. She’d cried. She’d prayed, but there hadn’t been any response from inside. Even if there had been, the windows didn’t slide open. They were part of the bright interior decor that’d attracted her to these offices in the first place.

Nobody was going to save her.

Her neck ached from the pressure of looking up but that was nothing compared to the pain in her fingers. The sedative had done its job. She still couldn’t feel a majority of her body, but her fingers and toes were the only things keeping her alive.

The roof was quiet now. Payton had been there one second and then gone the next, and a fresh wave of hopelessness took hold. She pressed the toe of her boot into the stucco and tried to press up. It was no use. There wasn’t a single inch of the building’s outer facade that angled up. Every accent, every frame—it all cascaded down to give viewers below the perfect illusion of grandeur and modernism. Mallory swallowed past the dryness in her mouth.

One wrong move, one wrong gust of wind, and it’d be over.

She didn’t want to die.

She still had so much she wanted to do. Build her own empire that rivaled her father’s firm, travel, make herself sick eating her favorite foods, fall in love. Her heart squeezed in her chest as Payton’s features bled into focus. They were supposed to be partners. That was it. He’d take a second look into her father’s death, and she’d move on with her life. But the past two days had altered her definition. He wasn’t just a resource to get what she wanted. He’d become something more. Someone who’d put her needs ahead of his own, someone who’d taken her safety seriously. Someone who’d supported her suspicion Roland Kotite had been murdered and drove her insides into a heated frenzy with just one look. No one else compared. Not to him.

And she wasn’t ready to give that up. She wasn’t ready to give up.

She had to think of something. Her fingers were already tired. She didn’t know how much longer she could hold on. Mallory bit the inside of her cheek to take her mind off the burn in her arms and shoulders. “Come on.”

The front of the office building bulged into a rounded column of glass, stucco, and steel from top to bottom where the side came within feet of the next section of ledges. Mere feet between them. If she could get to that side, she’d have more leverage to climb. She could get to Payton. Sweat built under her fingers and loosened her grip. Holding her breath, she forced one hand to slide toward the center column of the building.

Her strength gave out.

One arm swung down, her fingers brushing her jeans, and for the first time since catching her fall, she caught sight of the scene below. Dizziness chased through her head and wobbled her vision. An uncontrollable whimper escaped up her throat, and she hauled her hand back into place. No closer than she’d been before. Mallory pressed her face against the rough stucco, closing her eyes. “This is not how you’re going to die. Now move.”

She craned her head up and moved her pinky over an inch. Every muscle down her arms and back protested, but she couldn’t give up. The tendons in the backs of her hands threatened to escape the thin skin there as she scraped her ring finger over. Only half an inch, but it was enough. She worked through each finger, one by one, until her left hand had moved at least six inches closer to the building’s center column. Wind welled tears in her eyes, but she couldn’t swipe them away.

Two more feet. That was all she needed. She’d survived growing up in a household where Roland Kotite reigned with control, manipulation, and domination. She could do this. She worked through the same small movements in her right hand, and her boots skidded against the facade, too loud in her ears. It’d worked.

Pain unlike anything she’d endured cramped her upper arms. Mallory breathed through it the best she could, utilizing everything she’d learned in spin classes and yoga. “You really need to lift weights more. If you get out of this, you’re going to enter the Ms. Universe pageant. No excuses.”

Repeating the process twice more, she nearly relaxed at reaching the side of the building’s center column, but sliding across a building to get here was nothing compared to what came next. The toe of her boot scratched along the stucco. It skimmed against the deep window ledge to her left, but to make it, she’d have to let go of her current hand hold. A single sconce softly buzzed, the only thing standing between her and the next ledge. Elements like this weren’t meant to hold weight. They’d been installed as nothing more than exterior decor, but it was a risk she’d have to take if she wanted to make it out alive.

Her hands shook against her control. Mallory lifted her hand and clamped down on the sconce. It held, and the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding burst from between her lips. It wasn’t over. There was a chance her plan would fail, but she had to try.

This was her life. The one she’d built, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to let it slip between her fingers. She edged her boot onto the opposite ledge, stretching as far as her legs would allow and dragged her right hand to follow. Her toes made contact, but without anything to grab onto on the other side, she’d slip or go through the window. “Only one way to find out.”

She rolled her lips between her teeth and bit down to stay in the moment. It was now or never. Mallory skimmed her hand along the building and pressed her palm into the rough texture. She shoved away with everything she had.

Wind tendrilled through her hair and clothing as she left behind her support. She was going to make it. Panic replaced optimism as her boot slipped down the ledge, throwing her upper body out of balance. She slammed chest first and slapped her hands against solid cement. A scream filled her ears as her ribcage buckled around her organs from the impact.

The sedative had lost its paralyzing hold on her nervous system, but her movements were still clunky and uncoordinated. She twisted one foot to the side and used her knee against the building for better leverage, but it was no use. There wasn’t anything for her to grab onto. She was slipping. She was going to fall. “No. No!”

The window mere feet from her face shattered.

Something heavy flew over her head and arced out of sight.