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.He merely threw her a derisive look that spoke volumes.Her spine stiffened.“You really don’t deserve me, do you?”For an instant, something like pain crossed through Alex’s cold stare.But then the shutters closed again.Something snapped inside her.He was being an idiot, plain and simple.She battered against his internal barriers without much hope of breaking through, but she had to try.“You’re so convinced that any show of emotion is a sign of weakness that you can’t let yourself experience the most basic and simple of human emotions.I see a pitiful, broken human being when I look at you, Alex Peters, not some tough-as-nails superspy.You’re nothing more than a scared little boy running around trying to convince everyone else of how terrible you are.And you’re failing.Do you hear me? You’ve failed.”Waves of icy rage poured off him but she was too infuriated to care at this point.How dare he walk out on her like this?“Here you go, running away from home again.This is the cowardly act of a child, Alex.”He zipped the suitcase closed and set it on the floor by the door.He whirled so fast that she recoiled in spite of herself, and snarled right in her face.“You are an anchor around my neck, and furthermore, you betrayed me.I do not trust you.You do not deserve my love.I’m finished with you.”He grabbed the suitcase and stormed out of the bedroom, leaving her to stare at the empty doorway and struggling to draw her next breath.He was gone.Really, truly gone.It was as if the earth had fallen out from under her feet and she was plunging downward into a bottomless abyss that would never end.It was so tempting to let her knees buckle.To fall to the floor and curl up in a little ball and never uncurl.Blackness closed in around her heart, so dark and thick she didn’t think she would ever find her way out of it.But from somewhere deep, deep inside her a kernel of determination remained.Dammit, she was a McCloud.A fighter.She might have lost the man, but she wasn’t about to let him leave thinking she’d betrayed him.She would never betray a friend, let alone the man she had loved.He bloody well did not get to have the last word this time.She ran after him, but he’d already left the apartment.Crap, he was fast.She threw open the front door.The elevator was on its way downstairs already.She headed for the stairwell and flew down it, taking huge chunks of steps with every bound.This was her last chance to have her say.Once he left the building, she would never find him again.She tore out into the lobby with the intent to head for the driveway to block his car from leaving the parking garage.But as she raced outside, she spotted his silhouette striding down the street.He was on foot.She tore after him.“Alex Peters! I have one more thing to say to you!” she shouted.She heard the gunshot, a sharp clear sound piercing the silent night.Felt something hot slam into her chest.Was aware of being spun around and thrown into the door at her back.Registered the sound of shattering glass and remembered the pavement rising up to meet her.But then everything started to fade, gray heading toward black.And truth be told, she was kind of glad for that.She probably couldn’t have watched Alex walk out of her life for good, anyway.Poor Dawn.Poor Alex.Who would love either one of them now?CHAPTER FIFTEENAT THE SOUND of the gunshot, Alex spun down behind a car and whipped out his pistol.Sonofabitch.He’d been so furious with Katie he’d barged out here right into the damned line of fire.Of course, the CIA had sharpshooters out here to take him down.He scanned the rooftops looking for sniper perches.Where were the sight lines to him? Too many.He had to move to better cover.He spied a vestibule to the building next to his about twelve feet away.He could make it.He gathered himself, sprang forward and dived low, rolling into the deep doorway.Huh.No gunshot.Why hadn’t the sniper taken the shot? Surely the guy’d had time to get a bead on him and knew Alex would head for better cover quickly.He eased forward, staying in the shadows, but close enough to the street to scan the area.If there was a shooter out there, the guy was hidden too well for him to spot.Deep, waiting silence settled over the street.Into the night, he heard a faint sound.A moan.He was not a trauma surgeon for nothing.He’d heard that sound a thousand times.A semiconscious person in severe pain.Who in the hell was moaning out here.?Knowing exploded across his brain with the force of the gunshot.Katie.The shooter had taken out Katie.The bastard was using her as bait to draw him out.He should walk away from here.Let her bleed out.He owed her nothing.He wasn’t a gullible amateur to fall for such a thing.And yet, he checked out a route back to his building’s entrance that would give him maximum cover.What the hell.The act of moving back toward her should cause the sniper to take another shot at him and reveal his position.He darted from the safety of the doorway to the side of a parked car.No shot.Hmm.The sniper must be off to the side and not have a clear shot yet.Alex moved behind a steel trash can built around a tree trunk.He had significantly less cover here.The shooter should be able to get a bead on him from most of the street now.He braced for the hit, covering his head with his arms to prevent an outright kill shot.Still no shot.What was up with that?He looked around and spied Katie lying facedown in a spray of broken glass.Blood was spreading from underneath her, a river of red among the crystalline shards.Frowning, he moved away from the trash can toward her prone form.Why was the shooter waiting? Surely there was a sanction out on him by now, a kill-on-sight order.Even if the order was just to bring him in, they had to know he was armed and dangerous.At a minimum, any half-decent sniper would want to wing him.To drop him and take him out of commission.And yet, no shot was forthcoming.Had the sniper fled already?Why in the world would the sniper shoot Katie and then leave the area without shooting him, too? Unless.Oh, holy God.No.Swearing violently, Alex moved over to Katie fast and rolled her over.She was bleeding from a wound in the upper left quadrant of her chest.He worked quickly, his movements practiced as he ripped away her shirt to expose what turned out to be two wounds—an entry and an exit wound.He used the torn cloth to fashion makeshift pressure pads.Pressing down hard on the wounds and making her moan more loudly, he used his left hand to pull his necktie free.He bound the pressure pads in place rapidly, and then grabbed her arms and hoisted her over his back in a fireman’s carry.He took off jogging down the street toward a major thoroughfare.When he reached it, he started watching for a taxi and urgently hailed the first one he saw.The cabbie slowed and rolled down his window to yell, “Hey, buddy.I’ve got a fare, but I’ll radio for another cab to head over here!”Alex nodded his thanks and kept moving.Mustn’t stop.Mustn’t make himself and Katie any easier targets than they already were.God, he felt naked out here like this.Every cell in his body screamed for him to take cover.To go into full stealth mode
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