Page 27 of Dark Lover

Sam slowed fractionally.

And as she turned the corner, she saw a car swerving away from the down ramp to avoid a head-on collision with Maclean.

Maclean swerved between two pillars to avoid the next descending car and Sam came hood to hood with it. She swerved, hard, bouncing into the ramp’s concrete wall, metal screaming. The oncoming Volkswagen hit the ramp wall dead on.

Breathing hard, Maclean no longer in sight, she took the next corner. She swerved to avoid another descending car and sideswiped some parked vehicles, while the passing vehicle hit the garage posts. The next car coming down the ramp swerved to avoid a head-on collision, as did Sam. She drove her Lexus hard up the ramp, against the concrete wall, sparks shooting off her car. She heard the car she had just passed collide with either the ramp wall or a pillar.

And when she turned the next corner, she was on the garage’s top level. Maclean was racing the taxicab through the rows of parked cars.

Sam hit the brakes. The top level was mostly unoccupied, and she could see that the roof of the garage was a rectangle. The buildings on three sides were taller; she did not know what was on the fourth side.

Where was he going?

The only place for him to go was down, but he’d sped by the entrance ramp, and he was far from where she sat at the top of the exit ramp.

Sam realized he was heading for the open side of the garage. She shifted into gear and drove toward it.

Maclean didn’t stop.

Sam was close enough now to realize that the roof of the adjacent building was about two stories below the garage’s top floor. And she realized what he was going to do.

She braked hard. “Are you crazy?” she cried.

And as she spoke, the cab hit the low barrier wall, went through it and was briefly suspended in the air.

Then it fell.

And it landed hard on the lower roof.

Sam leapt from her Lexus and ran across the garage to the barrier wall. Below, she saw the cab on the asphalt roof, looking somewhat mangled. The driver side door opened and Ian Maclean got out.

He waved at her and, holding the parcel, started across the roof. A moment later he’d entered the building, disappearing from her view.

Sam dialed 911.

He was crazy. Either that, or he didn’t care if he lived or died.

CHAPTER FIVE

IAN WANTED TO WAKE UP.

So much dread began that he could not breathe.

But the scene was so innocent, his reaction made no sense—except that he knew something terrible was going to happen.

He watched the children milling down the front steps of the Brooklyn public school, from a distance. Laughing and chattering, they were being met by their parents and caregivers. He did not want to watch, but his focus zoomed in closer. One boy wasn’t laughing or speaking. His heart sank as he recognized the thin, sullen, dark-haired boy.

It was himself.

The focus shifted and he was that boy now, his heart hammering with fear. He liked school but he hated going home. He was always careful to never think about what might happen when he got there—until the last bell of the day rang, and there was no other choice.

A dark shadow fell into step beside him.

His fear increased. He ignored the fingertips sliding along his cheek. They walked the three blocks home in silence.

At the door of the house, he said, “Your grandfather has returned, Ian. He has special plans for you.”

Ian choked, closing his eyes. Months and sometimes even a year would go by without Moray returning. Ian knew he preferred Scotland to New York. He would dream about his never coming back—that he would finally be allowed to go home.