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an embrace from a beautiful woman.” His grin grew and he spread his arms wide. “In fact, anytime you want to throw yourself into my arms again, doll, you go right ahead.”
As tempting as his offer was, Sasha’s low growl started up again, and I glanced down at her, seeing her peering out from under my desk, her yellow gaze trained on the bathroom door. As fear twisted my stomach into knots, I scooped up my cat and grabbed Nicky’s hand. “We need to get out of here,” I announced, dragging him with me as I hurried toward the apartment door.
“You’re soaking wet,” he pointed out, pulling me to a stop. “You can’t go outside like that.”
I jerked out of his hold. “There’s no way in hell I’m staying here.” I hastily shoved my feet into my snow boots, my heart hammering. Sasha bared her teeth, hissing at some unseen menace. Her back claws dug into my stomach and tore at my T-shirt while her front claws did a number on my shoulder as she fought to get out of my arms, but I wasn’t about to leave her in my apartment with whatever was haunting it. I bit through the pain with a groan and grabbed my keys from the credenza just as the bathroom door slammed shut. Then my bedroom door. My desk chair tipped over with a crash. Then the coffee table upended, sending magazines and remote controls flying. I heard the cabinet doors in my kitchen burst open and then the sound of shattering glass.
“What the fuck?” Nicky mumbled, his brows drawing together in a confused frown as he instinctively moved to shield me.
“Go!” I shouted, throwing open the apartment door. “Go, now!”
As I grabbed the doorknob and slammed it shut behind me, I caught a horrifying glimpse of a ghostly face swooping toward me, its furious expression twisted with hatred and rage. I cried out as the door rattled in the frame as if someone was trying to wrench it open from the other side.
Not needing to be urged again, Nicky grabbed my hand and raced with me to the elevator. I punched the Down button over and over again, glancing over my shoulder several times during those long, agonizing seconds it took the elevator to arrive, fully expecting to be attacked again. Nicky was tense, alert, his gaze trained like a laser on my apartment door down the hall. His right hand was behind his back, tucked up under the hem of his sweater where I guessed his gun was concealed. Just as the elevator doors slid open, my apartment door burst inward and spewed a roiling mist into the hallway.
Nicky shoved me into the elevator, backing me into the corner, putting himself between me and the open doors, his gun now drawn as the doors creaked shut. There was a deafening crash against the closed doors just as the elevator hopped and began its descent.
My legs too weak to hold me any longer, I crumpled against the wall and would’ve ended up on the floor but for Nicky’s arm going around my waist. He stowed his gun, then wrestled Sasha away from me. “Turn her loose, doll,” he urged. “It’s all right. I got her.” It was only then I realized the cat was yowling with rage at being nearly squeezed to death in my panicked grip. With a gasp, I relinquished her to Nicky.
The next thing I knew, Nicky was half carrying me from my apartment building and shoving me into the front seat of a black Escalade. When we’d managed to put a few miles behind us, he slowed down a little and glanced over at me, his face drawn. Seeing me shivering in the passenger seat, my teeth chattering, he cranked up the heat. But it didn’t matter what temperature it was in the car. The chill in my bones had nothing to do with the cold.

Chapter Five
“You doin’ okay over there?”
I started at the sudden sound of Nicky’s voice, sending Sasha scrambling over my shoulder and into the backseat with a yowl of protest. I swallowed hard, considering his question, then nodded. “I think so.”
He glanced over at me and gave me his patented half grin. “That sounded convincing.”
I