Page 15 of Stolen Goods
“Uh, yeah,” he murmured, lips twitching with a smile he was clearly trying to contain. “It’s short for Thaddeus. My mom picked it. She thought it sounded fancy, or something. I think it’s ridiculous.”
All the mirth vanished from his face.
“I like it,” Addy quickly jumped in, partly out of innate politeness and party because, well, she did like it.Thaddeus.It was gallant. Princely. The sort of name that would have made her swoon just reading it across the page.
Did I read it somewhere? It sounds familiar…Addy blinked and turned to look out the window as her mind wandered.A book, maybe? Or a movie? Thaddeus. Thaddeus. Where did I hear that name recently?
A street sign came and went.
“Oh! We should have…” She trailed off, staring over her shoulder as the street vanished in the dark night. These empty country roads weren’t lit. “Never mind. If you make the next right, we’ll be fine. I’ll take you to my apartment. You can call Triple A when we get there, then I’ll have to call my boss to warn her about the shop, and well, the police to report the, uh, the, um…” Addy waved her hand in the air, at a loss for words.
Thad didn’t answer.
Shoot, was that forward, inviting him to my apartment? I didn’t mean it like that! I was just trying to be helpful. To be nice, after he, well, after he—
“Thank you for saving my life,” Addy blurted, neuroses getting to her. Silence made her skin crawl. “I can’t believe— That was crazy. Who were those men? Why were they after me? I’m a nobody. I mean, not a nobody, but no one important enough to kill, I would think. People usually like me. I’m very likeable.”
Addy paused to lick her lips, flicking a glance at Thad, who studied the road. A brooding silence permeated the air around him.
“Do you think they were sex traffickers?” She continued rambling the first thing that came to mind. He rolled his lips into his mouth and his cheeks puffed, as though holding something in. “I bet they were. I heard that a friend of a friend was almost kidnapped outside of a department store with her toddler a few months ago. Maybe these were the same guys? Oh, that was the right turn!”
They zipped by.
“Oh shoot, these roads can be so tough to spot if you’re not from around here. But that was the last one leading back to town. You’ll have to turn around. The road turns into a dead end in a few miles, nothing but the ramp to the highway.”
He didn’t turn around.
He didn’t slow the car.
And he didn’t speak either.
Addy swallowed, noticing the black leather interior of the car for the first time.Wait, this isn’t my car.Addy was too cheap to pay for a leather interior. Her seats were upholstered, and she had a pink steering wheel cover.Why did I think we’d gone to my car?“Hey, I thought your car…”
Her voice slipped away to nothing as the night’s events ran in fast-forward through her thoughts. Thad showing up in her store. Thad asking for her cell phone. Thad distracting her with art, then smoothly disappearing. Two men with guns showing up, asking if there’d been a man with her. Thad showing no hesitation as he dodged gunfire. Thad maneuvering with all the skill of a seasoned veteran. Thad—
Thunk.
All the locks in the car slid into place.
All the missing pieces did too.
“Oh my God!” Addy shouted, whipping her head to the side, meeting those steely eyes, sharp and cunning. No wonder he looked so familiar! He was on the cover of the magazine sitting on her nightstand back home. His face had been on the news every single night for a week—not that she watched the news, but she usually caught the last five or so minutes before the show she actually wanted to watch came on.Maybe I should have been watching the news. Maybe if I had, I would have recognized the most wanted criminal in America! Maybe I would have done the smart thing, like, I don’t know, running away and calling the police instead of falling at his feet and drooling over his smile! Gah!“You’re Thaddeus Ryder!”
“The one and only,” he mused, edge of his lip quirking with a smile, no shame whatsoever evident in his expression.
“Oh my God, those men weren’t trying to kill me—they were trying to kill you!”
He wrinkled his nose with thinly veiled judgment. “Honestly, I’m a little surprised it took you this long to realize that. Unless the world of wedding cake design is a lot more cutthroat than I ever realized.”
“You have no idea,” she commented darkly, and then jolted, looking around at the leather dashboard, the bullet hole in the windshield, the black paint on the hood. She gasped. “Your car didn’t break down!”
“No.”
“I bet this isn’t even your car.”
He didn’t respond.
“Is it stolen?”
