This was different. This was personal. Hadn’t she been through enough already?

He ran around the front of the vehicle and jumped in. Sped away from the hotel, passing squad cars that were belatedly racing to the scene. Torgerson would have backup should she need it. He doubted she would. Tim Carstairs’s issue was with Darby and now she was out of the picture he wouldn’t be a problem. The guy was beyond lucky he didn’t have a bullet in his skull.

Eban had been ready to squeeze the trigger on that motherfucker until Darby had asked him not to.

“I’m sorry.” Darby’s breath hitched and Eban was sure she was about to dissolve into tears, but she didn’t.

“Why are you sorry?” He could barely speak, let alone breathe. He drove fast, taking a few turns, adjusting when the back tires started to skid. Last thing he needed was to get into a wreck.

“I don’t know. Habit, I guess.” She gripped her throat. “I’m grateful to you for saving me again.”

Saving her? He’d fucked up. He’d left her alone. He hadn’t shot the motherfucker the moment he walked into the hotel. Sure, his training told him to use words to resolve situations, and he was good at it. Usually. The outcome was generally better for everyone when it ended without violence. Except it meant he’d had to calmly talk to the asshole who’d held the blade that had sliced the delicate skin of Darby’s neck.

He moved her fingers aside. Had the guy hit an artery or vein? A smear of blood was visible but not a gush. He let go of a sigh of relief. “How deep did it go?”

“Not deep.” She dragged an antiseptic wipe out of her purse. Winced as she dabbed the thin cut.

It would be sore as hell. He was furious with himself. “I’m sorry. I should have just shot the bastard.”

“What? No.” She pulled down the sun visor and tilted up her jaw to examine the cut in the mirror. Blood trickled down her neck in a thin rivulet.

“I gave him a chance because he wasn’t thinking straight, but…” Eban gritted his teeth, pissed with the decision he’d made. “I put you at risk.”

“You gave him a chance to do the right thing because that’s what you do. It’s who you are.”

Darby was wrong about that. He was more than capable of using deadly force should the situation warrant it. This one had. He should have taken the shot.

She winced as she swallowed. “I’m not saying that was any fun, but it would have been a thousand times worse if you’d killed him. I do not need that level of guilt.”

Guilt? Why would she feel guilty? The man had attacked her without provocation.

Her throat rippled as she swallowed. He kept one eye on the road but, he needed to see she was okay. That she wasn’t about to bleed out on the way to the hospital.