02 | Illegal Activity

I WATCHED, PARALYSED, AS A man who shouldn't even be able to get up on his own, let alone quickly, thrashed his way out of a hospital bed. I was a nurse, but the sight of him tearing an IV drip from his vein had me feeling light-headed.

His face contorted with pain, but he set his teeth and threw the ECG monitor away from him, stumbling to his feet.

It was at that moment that I finally regained the ability to react.

"Sir," I began shakily, holding out my arms as if to stop him. "Sir, you need to get back onto that bed."

He didn't even acknowledge me. He paused only to examine his injuries, wincing at his two gunshot wounds before proceeding to launch himself in the direction of the door.

I knew, in that moment, I had a decision to make. Either I could let him throw himself through the door, meeting the two police guards outside and likely worsening any pending charges against him, or I could stop him.

I wasn't a bold person. I was quiet, thoughtful and usually pacifistic.

But in that moment, I was bold. I jumped between the man and the door, closing my eyes and hoping for the best as he came closer and closer.

I opened one eye a crack and saw him staring at me, just half a meter away. The sight of such a masculine guy in a hospital gown was almost enough to crack my worried expression into a smirk, but I refrained.

"Move," he demanded sharply. His voice was deep and gruff, yet he held a distinctly upper-class British accent. For some reason, I hadn't been expecting that, and as adrenaline caught up with me, I realised I was breathless.

When I didn't respond, the man began to move forward but I quickly stopped him with the words, "there are police."

He halted again and I blew out a relieved breath as he studied me. His charcoal eyes took in my face, that I'm sure was arranged in some oddly nervous expression, and then my clothes. His face seemed to relax somewhat when he saw I was in nurse's scrubs, and his dark gaze flickered back up to mine.

He pointed at the door without looking away from me. "Out there?" I nodded. "How many?"

"Two."

"B'lyad'!" he growled lowly, eyes finally flickering towards the door.

(Fuck!)

"Um," I mumbled, thinking I had misheard something, "what?"

"Never mind."

He stepped away from me at last and finally I could breathe. I focused on taking deep breaths and keeping my mind away from any thoughts revolving around the prospect of me being in danger.

The man scanned the room quickly but thoroughly as I watched in shocked silence. His movements were clearly being impeded by the pain he must have been in, but what he managed to achieve with one arm in a sling was impressive.

"I need some clothes," he said to me expectantly.

I shook my head. "You can't leave, your injuries—"

"—are irrelevant," he finished.

"But the police outside aren't. There's no way out of here."

I folded my arms to keep them by my sides; I didn't want to think about the further damage he'd be doing to himself by straining fresh wounds. It took everything in me not to fuss over him; nursing was in my nature.

The man considered for a moment. His eyes searched my face again and again, as if hunting for a trace of something. The intensity of his gaze coloured my cheeks until I had to look away.

He took a step closer—had it suddenly become hard to breathe?—and read my name badge. "Grace." He tried out the word and I found that in his voice it wasn't disagreeable. "Grace," he repeated again, "I need you to help me."

Oh, God. That voice and those eyes. He was so utterly demanding and yet there was a slight purr in his tone that made my legs feel weak.

Stop it! I cursed myself. He could be part of an international crime ring or anything!

"Why should I help you?" I demanded, though my voice weakened when he took another step. I gulped. "If there's police outside your door, you've done something wrong. Why should I help a criminal? Did you cause the explosion?" My tone became more and more accusatory as I continued my questions, confidence growing in my chest.

The man sighed, and somewhere in that sigh I heard my name as light as a breath of wind. "Grace," he breathed. I shuddered. The way he said it, it was as though he knew me—as though he'd known me my whole life.

I backed up until I was pressed to the door, desperate to put more space between us. I wouldn't help a criminal. He deserved to rot in jail, to stay there forever. He deserved to be punished.

But did I know that for sure? Did I really know he was a bad guy? What if he was innocent? What if he'd been between lines of fire? The seed of doubt in my mind stopped me from throwing open the door and running away.

"I didn't cause the explosion," he said earnestly.

My gaze narrowed. "How do I know that?"

"Look," he commanded, and I did. I looked into the charcoal of his eyes and I knew that one way or the other, he'd get what he wanted. "It was a case of wrong place, wrong time, and now I need to get out of here to find my father. I don't know if he made it out alive."

"If you're innocent then why are police officers stood outside your room?"

"They want to question me."

With the story about his father circling my head, it was becoming very difficult to resist. "So let them," I shrugged. "You're innocent."

"Grace," he implored me, suddenly far more serious. "If they question me, they will find a reason to lock me away because of who I am and where I come from."

"The South of England?" I smirked. He shot me a glare that said be serious and I rearranged my expression.

"Please," he breathed at last, and I felt the last fragments of my resolve floating away.

I rolled my eyes in defeat. "Fine," I assented, unable to believe what I was hearing from my own mouth.

This is totally wrong you could be helping a bloody criminal! What if this classes you as an accomplice? Huh?

"You really shouldn't be leaving hospital with those wounds," I sighed.

He glanced to his arm as if he hadn't even noticed before. "Well, if you have any more of those wonderful pain meds they had me on..." he smirked.

"Be serious," I chided, and humour coloured the charcoal of his eyes so they became a shade or two warmer. "What do I do?"

"Have they put my clothes and belongings somewhere?"

"There's a locker room," I nodded.

"And you can get to it?"

"Yes."

"Then first I need you to bring me my clothes and my phone," he instructed, taking a few steps back and leaning against the bed. I could see him holding back the pain that wanted to write itself on his face. I wanted to tell him it's okay but I got the impression he wasn't one for showing signs of weakness.

"Can you get the clothes in here without being noticed?"

"I'll hide them in a trolley and say I'm going to redress your wounds," I explained, my eyes drifting towards his injured arm. "Which I really should be doing."

"Later," he promised. "Now go."

Cursing myself on the way out for getting myself into such a situation, I nodded at the police officers in an attempt to act 'normal' that may or may not have actually been suspicious.

I wasn't inherently a liar. It wasn't in my nature to be deceptive or cunning, and I avoided conflict at almost all costs. Trying to smuggle a (quite possibly criminal) patient out of hospital behind the backs of law enforcement agents, therefore, would be a task no less than gargantuan for a girl like me.

The walk to the locker room was fraught with my own incessantly anxious thoughts. Every time I saw another member of staff or an officer I would drop my gaze to the floor, wondering how long it might be before they were on to me.

I slipped inside the room unseen and quickly found the locker that matched patient room 113G. All nurses and doctors had access to a master key that would supply access to any of the lockers. I pushed mine into the lock and turned, throwing open the creaky metal door. Somehow, part of me expected to find something incriminating; a gun, a weapon, something alluding to illegal activity.

All I found was a crumpled black suit. There were tattered holes littering the material no doubt caused by the explosion and subsequent fires, and the white shirt was stained red. I picked up the jacket wondering if anything here was salvageable.

It wasn't.

Half of me wanted to just walk away. The better half of me—the more afraid part, perhaps—considered aborting my mission altogether. I could walk away and leave that man, whoever he was, to fix his own problems. But the other half of me—the one that had apparently taken over—found herself fumbling with the suit to find out the size.

It was one thing to discover that, when the explosion went off, this stranger I was helping had been wearing a suit. It went part of the way toward comforting me. After all, criminals didn't wear suits, did they? They weren't civilised, they were savages! Weren't they? The most startling part of my discovery, however, was the label of the suit. Armani.

He wore bloody Armani suits!! Who was this man? What had he done to accumulate such obvious wealth at such a young age? He couldn't have been much older than me, and I was only twenty one!

I double checked the locker for a mobile phone (there wasn't one) and then shut it back up again, suit still inside. There was no salvaging the scraps of it now - and he certainly couldn't leave the hospital inconspicuously in such attire.

When I finally emerged from the room again fifteen minutes later, I had a pair of dark blue jeans and a pale salmon tshirt tucked under my right arm, along with a pair of black converse. It had taken me an age to find clothing that fitted my stranger's size; he was tall but fairly slim, well-built without being bulky. I was sure he might have something to say about the style of clothing I had supplied, but there was no way in hell I was going to spend more time searching for something more appropriate.

I felt bad about stealing someone else's clothes, but I knew I'd feel even worse if I deserted someone I'd promised to help. Anyway, I vowed to return clothes to the locker as soon as I could.

Grabbing a medical trolley, I shoved the clothes beneath it in a tray where they were concealed and headed back in the direction of patient room 113G.

The officers waved me through this time without even batting an eyelash, and I immediately felt a wave of guilt washing over me. I was deceiving police officers. That was a crime, probably a bad crime. And what for? I didn't even know this man, I had no obligation to him. This wasn't me; wasn't the Grace who turned bright red even at the thought of telling a white-lie.

It was too late now, anyway.

The man stood as soon as I entered the room, pushing the trolley in front of the bed. He glanced at me with a neutral expression—no relief, no slowly ebbing panic. "I thought you weren't coming," he stated, though it certainly didn't seem that way. It seemed like he felt indifferent about the whole situation, though I got the feeling that was part of his façade.

"I had a few...problems," I admitted. I pulled back the curtain at the bottom of the trolley but hesitated. "Your suit, um, well, it was kind of...ruined."

I waited for a backlash of anger or some sort of frustrated outburst. After all, the suit must have been worth over three months of my wages!

When no emotion washed over his face, I continued, "I found some other clothes that matched your size."

At this, a hint of a smile curved his lips crookedly. I looked away for fear that he would see my blush; he'd barely even smiled and it still looked devastatingly seductive.

"Pass me them," he instructed, using his good arm to pull the hospital gown over his head.

I quickly shut my eyes and turned my head away. If my cheeks had been pink before, they were beet red by now.

"Grace?" I closed my eyes tighter. "Pass me the clothes. You can open your eyes."

I shook my head vigorously. "I'd like to keep my innocence, thank you very much!" I fumbled blindly in the trolley and managed to locate the clothes, thrusting them into the air where I hoped he was still stood.

"Innocence," he mused quietly, taking the clothes from my outstretched hand. "A rare commodity."

I kept my mouth and eyes firmly shut.

"So, Grace, you're a nurse, huh?"

"Yep." I popped the 'p'. "It's not as glamorous as the Halloween costumes make out."

I could hear the shifting of material as he pulled on the clothes, probably with a great deal of effort, considering one of his arms was out of action. He let out a low chuckle. "I wouldn't say glamorous is quite the right word."

"Well..." the blush crept back. "...sexy."

"Hmm," he mused. "Open your eyes, Grace."

Hesitantly, I did, half expecting him to still be naked or something. He wasn't. Instead he sported the casual clothing and managed to look entirely out of place. I could see why the guy wore suits - salmon definitely wasn't his colour.

"This wasn't the most fashion-forward choice," he pointed out, staring down at the shirt.

"My options were limited," I responded flatly. "Anyway, it's less conspicuous than a bloody Armani suit if you're planning on escaping." I stood up and took a step away from the trolley.

"I am," he responded intensely. Since when had he gotten so close to me?

I swallowed. "Um, what?"

"I am planning on escaping." He checked the jeans pockets as though they were his own, then returned his gaze to me. "No phone?"

"It wasn't in the locker."

"Chert!"

(Damn!)

"Was that a different language?" I frowned. I really didn't know anything about this guy, I suddenly realised.

"It was nothing."

I told myself I didn't care about his evasiveness. After all, I was never going to see him again beyond today. "So how are you going to escape?" I wondered, folding my arms and sitting on the bed.

I was conscious that if I remained in this room for much longer somebody was going to get suspicious. How long did I have? How long did it take to redress wounds? Ten, fifteen minutes at most.

The man smirked and stalked closer to the bed where I was perched. I felt my heart rate spike when he touched my knees through the blue nylon of my trousers, prising them apart with gentle but firm hands. He stepped between them, and leaned closer. "You're going to help me, Grace."

If I'd noticed anything about him since we'd met, it was that he never posed anything as a question - everything was a demand, everything was certain. I closed my eyes as my head began to spin from his proximity. This was not good. This was not supposed to happen.

I curled my hand into a fist and pressed it against his chest, pushing lightly. "I don't even know your name," I said, my voice barely a whisper.

"Alex."

I waited for an elaboration, a surname, perhaps, but nothing more was offered. "Well, Alex..." He was watching me intensely as I released a deep breath. "What's the plan?"

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