At some point, he’d lost a shoe.
It was a long while before his heart stopped pounding and he had the wherewithal to hail a cab.
He called Tessa as soon as he got home to his studio apartment (which looked especially pathetic after spending time at The Mark) and told her everything.
She was quiet for a long while. “Are you seriously telling me that you somehow lost your shoe during this dramatic escape?”
Micah fought the urge to groan. “That’s what you took from that?”
“Sorry, it’s just that for a while, I was convinced we were immersed in some weird, gay-as-fuck version of Pretty Woman. Now, I’m leaning towards Cinderella, except instead of a prince, you’ve managed to entangle yourself with some hot billionaire who would rather feed your little string bean body than fuck you.”
Micah sighed. “You’re the worst, you know that, right?” But he couldn’t deny that a smile was pulling at the corner of his mouth for the first time since disaster had struck at Damon’s suite.
“Would I take pleasure in your pain?”
“Yes, yes you would,” Micah accused.
“Well, on the bright side, you know his full name now. If you decide you want to look him up after our investigation is over, well…”
Micah snorted. “I think Damon made it pretty clear he’s not interested in any sort of relationship with me that’s not motivated by pity.”
He’d humiliated Micah.
Which begged the question… why couldn’t he squelch the tiny bit of hope buried deep in his gut that he’d run into the man again during his next stakeout?
CHAPTER THREE
“Suck that succulent, little lip back into your mouth and stop pouting.”
Micah shot Tessa an unimpressed look from where she hovered over his shoulder, frizzy wisps of red hair escaping the ponytail she’d forced it into despite her efforts to tame her wild mane. “I’m not pouting,” he protested before allowing his gaze to drift back to the computer screen he was sat in front of.
“Oh good. Because that would be pretty ridiculous… you know, considering our department was just credited with catching the Hooker Hunter, the serial killer who’s been terrorizing New York City prostitutes for the past six months.”
A guest of a rundown motel in Queens had called 9-1-1 in the early hours of Thursday morning, when she’d heard screams and what sounded like a struggle in the room next to hers. When police had arrived to investigate, they’d discovered a man assaulting a young, male prostitute, who’d been stripped and bound naked to a chair.
“Yeah, but we didn’t do anything. Jensen’s the one who got a confession from this Jacob Normandy guy – who I’m still not convinced is our perp, by the way.”
Normandy’s victim had been a prostitute, yes, and he’d been tied up – a criteria they’d been using to identify victims of the Hooker Hunter since they’d all been discovered with rope burn around their wrists and ankles.