Hot Gossip by Susanne O'Leary

Author:Susanne O'Leary
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Irish love story, Ireland, Atlantic coast, Irish romance, French Heroine
Publisher: Susanne O'Leary
Published: 2014-12-06T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

JANINE NODDED SLOWLY. She was pressed against a man’s body that smelled of sweat and garlic. She knew, without looking, that the sharp object against her temple was a gun.

“Not a sound, is that clear?” the voice wheezed in her ear.

She nodded again.

The gun was removed. She turned around to face the intruder. Her heart stopped. She would have sunk onto the floor if he hadn’t caught her. Disbelieving, she stared at him. Was this a dream? Or had she stepped into some kind of twilight zone? Was it...could it...? “Jake,” she said in a whisper like a whoosh from the cold breeze blowing in through the open window.

He grinned. “Surprised?”

She couldn’t speak. Her eyes drifted to the weapon in his hand. Not the Beretta but a smaller, even more lethal-looking pistol. Black and stubby, it sat in his hand like a cobra ready to strike. She backed away. “You were going to shoot me?”

He made a gesture with the pistol. “No, but...I didn’t know what you’d do. Didn’t even know if it was you coming in here. Could have been the dude you were spending the evening with.”

“Pretty little toy.”

He looked at it. “Yeah. Walther PPK. Can make a nice little hole in someone’s head. Fits into my inside pocket nicely. Very handy in tight spots.”

“Oh.” Her knees like jelly, Janine sank down on the edge of the bathtub. Shivering uncontrollably, she kept staring at him. Jake, but not the Jake she remembered. Not the laughing, suntanned, blond vagabond with the brilliant smile and sparkling eyes. He had shaved his head and his face was battered. His nose looked as if it had been broken and there was a jagged scar above his eyebrow. His skin above the stubble was pale and blotchy and there was a mean edge in the steel blue eyes.

“Jake,” she said again, not believing her eyes.

He looked at her with just the hint of a smile. “Yes, babe, it’s me.”

Janine pushed her hair away from her face, her hand shaking. “I thought...they told me you were dead. They showed me your Beretta, so I was sure.”

He shrugged. “Hell, yeah, that was bad luck. They took a potshot at me that caught me in the chest. I fell, stunned for a while. Thought I’d bought it, to be honest. Must have looked dead to those guys. They grabbed my Beretta and kicked me a couple of times. Then they just took off. I stayed there for a while, but then I realised the wound was just superficial. The bullet had hit the edge of my phone in the pocket of my shirt and just grazed my chest. The impact stunned me and there was quite a lot of blood. I managed to find a small pharmacy that was still open and got some bandages. The shop keeper helped me stem the blood and fix up the wound.”

“Oh,” was all Janine managed to say. She kept looking at him, trying to come to terms with him being there, right in front of her.

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