SHATTERED Read Online Free PDF

than staying alive?
    Bypassing Mike’s body, he grabbed a bright throw from the back of a chair and started to drape it across the dead man, then stopped. The least he could do was preserve the crime scene until the experts got here. The camera on his phone had exploded with everything else, but maybe he’d find another one somewhere in with Mike’s possessions.
    Which reminded him that Mike’s keys, wallet and cell appeared to be missing, along with his computer and who knew what else. Was this a robbery gone wrong or was it something more complicated?
    He dropped the throw back on the chair and went looking for Sarah. He found her in her father’s room, poking into the now unlocked gun cabinet that Nate had opened by finding the key tucked away in the pocket of the hunting vest hanging beside it.
    “What are you doing?” he said.
    She turned suddenly, a bulging manila envelope in her hands. There were additional boxes and envelopes piled on the bed as well. Her eyes widened as though she’d forgotten he was there. Or maybe she was just startled he’d made it back alive. “Did you get him?” she asked. “Did you see who it was?”
    “No to both,” he said.
    She swallowed as she pushed her left hand down into her pocket. Was she holding something? The past hour or so had somehow honed her beauty into a grittier, darker form, enhanced by the dirt smudged on her jeans and across her cheek. In all honesty, it made her twice as sexy as she’d been, and that was saying something.
    His head swam in the sudden heat of the room and he swayed a little. “What’s in the envelope?”
    “Dad’s retirement stuff. I was looking for some old papers of mine.”
    “Old papers,” he responded, his voice dry.
    “Yeah. School papers, my diploma... Listen, it doesn’t matter. They’re not here.”
    “Anything else interesting in there?” he asked, nodding toward the safe.
    “No,” she said quickly. “Just genealogy stuff. Dad got off on that tangent a few years ago when he and Mom split up.” She stared harder at him, then gasped. “You’re bleeding!”
    He followed the direction of her gaze to the torn, blood-soaked sleeve of his jacket and the red smears on his hand. “Yeah,” he said and sat down abruptly on the side of the bed.
    She was there in front of him almost at once. “What happened?”
    “Score one for the bad guy.”
    “Oh, man, this is my fault,” she said, running to the adjoining bathroom and returning with a stack of clean towels. “Take off your jacket. Here, I’ll help you.”
    She very carefully unzipped the front of his jacket, which put her head next to his, and he breathed in the scents of hay and snow, an odd combination and bracingly refreshing. Her hair brushed his forehead and he closed his eyes, not trusting himself to look at her. He’d always been a sucker for blue eyes and this wasn’t the time or place for that kind of thing.
    “Easy now,” she coaxed and gingerly helped him get his good arm out of the sleeve. Then she began peeling away the other sleeve, which hurt like blazes, and he winced.
    “Sorry,” she said. “Almost done.” She dropped the jacket to the floor. “We’d better get your shirt off, too.” That took longer and was agonizing for Nate as she freed his good arm from the heather-gray Henley and began the painstaking process of loosening the other sleeve from his injured arm.
    “It’s stuck to the blood,” she explained.
    He swallowed and nodded.
    “Just a minute, okay?” She went back to the bathroom and returned a moment later with a brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide and bandages. “Maybe this will help,” she said and, using the towel beneath his arm to absorb the overflow, drenched the site with the peroxide, loosening the knitted material from the wound. A moment later she managed to slip the shirt over his head and he sighed deeply with profound relief.
    She looked a little pale as she considered his arm but, to her credit, didn’t shy