The stab of loss is excruciating. A sob climbs my throat. I swallow hard in an effort to keep it down.
“Jake?”
The sound comes from far away.
My head swings slowly. Casey has hold of my bicep. He’s saying my name as he drags me toward the car. His lips are moving. “Mac needs you,” they seem to say.
He opens the passenger door of Jared’s Porsche. I slide inside. Numb. He shuts it behind me. Jogging around the front, Casey slams into the driver’s seat and guns the engine, roaring off before he even has the door fully shut.
“Jared is going with Travis in his car,” he explains without me asking the question.
Good.
I can’t be around the Valentine brothers right now. Violence simmers under my skin, ready to unleash on any one of them without notice. A single punch to each brother in the face will make me feel better. Every day. A punch a day, until they add up to the number of days since they started this shit.
My eyes focus outside the window. The night is dark but the traffic lights are bright. I stare, watching them blur into each other as we speed through the quiet streets.
“Where is she?”
Casey glances across at me. I feel his concern. It’s like a thick fog blanketing the interior of the car. “I don’t know.” At least he’s honest. “But we’ll find her,” he vows.
The light of dawn is hitting the horizon when we finally get a break on Mac’s location, though it isn’t the kind of break we’re hoping for. A phone call between Casey and Travis confirms that Evie, supposedly on lockdown at the duplex where we’ve been living on the seaside suburb of Bondi Beach, has gone rogue.
Mac clearly taught her well. Evie disappeared just a half hour earlier, spiriting her car out of the driveway, along with the gun Mac keeps in a locked box on the top shelf of her walk-in robe.
At least we have her on GPS. All the manpower we had tracking down leads is now zeroed in on Evie’s Hilux truck.
I glance at the speedometer on the little dashboard. The speed limit is eighty. We’re doing a hundred. “Can’t you go any faster?” I bark at Casey.
Casey shifts gears with a grim expression and pushes his foot down harder. We’re hitting one-twenty when his phone rings, the sound barely audible over the growl of the engine. It’s sitting in the centre console and lights up showing Jared’s name.
“Answer it,” Casey orders, his eyes glued to the road.
I pick it up and hit the green button. “You’re on speaker,” I say to the phone and rest it back in the centre.
“He’s got Evie.” Jared’s voice is hoarse. “He has my sister and now he has Evie.”
I tip my head back against the seat, eyes unseeing. It’s impossible to think about whether Mac is hurt or dead. And now Evie. I can barely function as it is.
“Dammit,” Casey mutters.
“We have an address where the Hilux stopped five minutes ago.” Jared rattles off a residence in the south of Sydney. “We’re ten minutes out. You?”
We’re maybe fifteen minutes at the least. Casey and I share a mutual glance before he accelerates further.
“We’re right behind you,” I tell him.
“Jake, I—”
“Don’t. Let’s just focus on getting Mac and Evie out safe.”
Jared huffs a shaky breath. “Right.”
I end the call and drop back in my seat. My hands are shaking. I fist them and rest them on my knees.
“She’s going to be fine.”
“I know,” I tell him, but I don’t. He doesn’t either. I can tell by the tone in his voice.
Mac is a loose cannon. There’s no telling what she’ll do in any given situation. But if anything, she’ll fight with every breath she has. Mac was forged in fire. She’ll give him hell.
I check my watch. Ten minutes out. Why has time slowed to a snail’s pace? It’s unbearable.
“Jake …” Casey begins and then stops as though he’s thinking about how to say what he wants to say. Whenever there’s a pause like that, it’s never good. I brace. “You can’t tell Mac that you know.”
“What?”
“About what happened. With the car accident. And the … baby.”
Is he serious? I shoot Casey an angry glare. “Why not?”
“We don’t know what she’s been through tonight. If you tell Mac what really happened, it will put a huge wedge between her and her brothers. She’ll shut them out in an instant, which is not what she needs right now. She’s going to need her family, Jake.”
My teeth clamp together as his advice sinks in. I come to the same realisation—one I would never have reached without him pointing it out.
“Fuck!” I yell, slamming a fist on the dash in front of me. “This is bullshit. Damn you, Casey.”
His voice is low. “I’m sorry.”
But he’s right. We both know it.
“So I have to keep being the bad guy.”
“You’re not the bad guy,” Casey tells me.
“I’ve always been the bad guy,” I mutter, frustration making my chest tight. I glance at my watch again. Seven minutes out. Time has slowed further.
We’re almost there, Princess. Please be okay.
“If you were the bad guy, you wouldn’t be in this car right now. You wouldn’t be fighting like you are. You would have given up.”
“I can’t give up.”
“And Mac will see that. When the time is right, you can tell her and she’ll see that you were always there fighting when a lesser man would never have tried.”
“I hope to god you’re right, Casey.”
He shrugs, forcing a grin that doesn’t reach his eyes. “I’m always right.”
“Except when you’re wrong.”
A light chuckle escapes him. He nods his head. “Except when I’m wrong.”
Five minutes out.
Three minutes out.
I stare out the window, focused on breathing.
“I love her, you know.”
Casey’s voice is soft. “I know.”
I swipe a hand across my face, exhausted and on edge. My cheeks are scratchy with five days of beard. Mac likes the facial hair but when it gets to the point of being itchy, I always get the shits and shave it off. Maybe this time I’ll keep it.
“How do you know?” I eventually ask, wondering how Casey sees it when no one else does.
“Because you stand up to her in a way no one else does. And she lets you.”
Two minutes out.
“I never noticed that.”
“I did.”
“You notice a lot of shit, Daniels.”
“I do.”
“Do you think what Mac’s brothers did was right? You knew and you never said anything.”
Casey shakes his head, downshifting gears as we turn a sharp corner. “I think they were so blinded in their duty to protect Mac that they didn’t think about how much damage it would cause. Travis feels a lot of guilt. He told me. And Jared still struggles with the knowledge of what he did. It was an accident, Jake. A stupid, horrible accident, but the fallout was huge.”
“Damn straight it was huge.”
“You have to let them put things right.”
One minute out.
“Maybe in some other lifetime,” I mutter.
Thirty seconds.
Casey floors it around another corner, fishtailing onto the street of the address we were given. We can both see the house we’re aiming for. It’s white weatherboard. A dilapidated, rundown heap of shit set in a neighbourhood you wouldn’t send your worst enemy. Three cars are out front. The one in the drive is an old Mazda hatchback. Parked on an angle in front of it is Evie’s bright blue Hilux. Right in the middle of the street sits a souped-up black Subaru WRX, both doors wide open. Black tyre tread marks the road behind it. The car belongs to Travis.
“The glove compartment,” Casey barks urgently.
I seize the handle, ripping it open. Two handguns rest inside. I take the
m out and check both with practised efficiency before handing one to Casey.
He brings the Porsche to a screaming halt in the street. I’m out of the car and running without missing a beat, my heart in my throat. I vault the porch stairs and tear through the front door, my gun in both hands, breathing out of control from panic. Casey comes up behind me. We’re moving quietly through the front section of the house when I hear the sweetest sound of my life. It rings out loud and clear.
“Goddamn asshead!”
My legs almost give out beneath me. I can’t lock the emotion down. I’m not trained for this shit.
“Thank Jesus,” Casey mutters from my right.
Jared yells in response. And Travis. But I hear nothing from Evie.
We abandon all stealth and run through a large archway toward the back of the house. I come to a dead stop, absorbing the scene before me in a single second.
Jimmy is on the ground, a bullet in the middle of his forehead and blood pooling beneath him. Across from him lies Evie, flat on the floor. Both Jared and Travis are kneeling on either side of her. Both shirts are off and pressing against Evie’s chest. She’s covered in blood. It’s splattered across her face and chest, her hands, her legs. It’s everywhere.
“Fuck!” Jared’s agonised roar fills the room. “Where are the fucking paramedics?”
My gaze finds Mac. She’s strapped to a wooden chair with clear plastic cable ties. Blood drips down the side of her face from a split brow, her right eye is almost swollen shut, and her wrists and ankles are bleeding and raw.
The pretty cream-coloured blouse she paired with dark jeans for the concert is torn and filthy, covered with grime and sweat and blood.
Her eyes are on Evie, but they shift to me when we come in the room. “Jake,” she mouths, her jaw trembling. She clamps it tight, holding herself together.
I tuck the gun in the back of my jeans and move quickly.
“Nice of you to show up,” she mumbles as I crouch in front of her.
“We got here as fast as we could, Princess,” I reply as I check the ties that bind her hands to the arms of the chair. She flinches at my ministrations. Her skin is a bloodied mess from where they cut in to her.
“Well, I had the situation handled, just so you know.”
“Of course you did.” My voice is muffled as I shift lower to inspect her ankles. “I need a—”
Casey waves a pocketknife in my face.
“—knife.”
I flick the blade and make quick work of the ties. Mac stands on shaky legs, sucking in sharp, pained breaths as I peel them from her wrists.
“Baby,” I whisper, staring at the damage.
My eyes lift, finding hers. Her entire body has begun to shake. Shock is setting in fast. She holds my gaze as she trembles, her expression tortured. “Evie’s going to be okay.”
She says it as a statement but I hear her need for reassurance. I nod, cupping her cheeks in my hands. My voice is firm. “Evie’s going to be fine.”
“That sonofabitch shot her. Twice. I told her not to come.”
“Would you have not come if the situation were reversed?”
Her voice wobbles yet she stands strong. “No.”
“Then don’t even go there.”
Mac nods, swallowing. I take my hands from her face and wrap them around her. My hug locks her arms by her sides. She buries her face in my neck for a moment. I died a thousand deaths in the hours she was gone.
The faint sound of a siren cuts through the air.
Casey leaves to direct the ambulance officers while Jared and Travis push down on Evie’s wounds. She’s breathing but it’s erratic. There’s nothing we can do short of getting in the way, so we stand together and wait.
“Jake,” she whispers hoarsely, shivering.
“Mmm?”
“Don’t let go.”
My arms lock tighter, my eyes burning as I hold on. I don’t want to let go.
I let out an unsteady breath.
Don’t ever ask me to let go.
MAC
I wake, blinking open gritty eyes to a warm summer morning. The sun streams through an open window. Sheer white curtains billow in the soft breeze, bringing with it the salty tang of the nearby ocean. Moving my head on the pillow, I realise I’ve slept in my own room for the first time in three nights. My bed is a soft fluffy cloud, so much nicer than the rock they call a mattress in the doom of Ward 2A.
My room here is decorated in white. Cool, crisp sheets, fresh painted walls, white-framed photographs. No colour. Not in my private space. Colour is fine to wear, but here I need no distraction; white is quiet, inoffensive, and gives me no bullshit.
I was in the hospital overnight, suffering minor wounds and dehydration. The second night I slept in a chair, refusing to leave the Critical Care Unit where Evie was stationed. She fought a hard battle through the first night, but she won, surviving two gunshot wounds that should have been fatal. You would think Jared would be rejoicing, but he’s moping around as though she’s in a coma with days left to live. It makes no sense but that’s my brothers for you. They’re unpredictable dickheads.
A bang comes from my left. I turn my head. Jake is carrying a timber tray in both hands, using it to push open the bedroom door. His eyes come to me once the tray is stable. He assesses me with a careful scan as he walks in.
Seemingly assured I’m alive and breathing, he sets his burden on the white-washed timber bedside table. It has my belly rumbling. Juice, coffee, toast heaped with poached eggs and a pile of bacon high enough to feed all the animals of Africa. I glare at the addition of a yellow rose in a little white ceramic vase. It’s not red, but it still screams romance.
“What’s with the flower, Nurse Betty?”
He straightens and folds his arms. “You’re a grouch when you’re injured, Princess. Thought it might cheer you up.”
Jake has been unusually solicitous since my kidnapping, as though another abduction is imminent. The hovering is downright aggravating, but I can’t ignore the benefits. Jake has brought me food, dressed solely in a pair of football shorts. That singular scrap of clothing makes his miraculous body appear all the bigger.
My eyes shift from the wonderment of his chest and back to the rose. It has no doubt been snipped from the neighbour’s yard in an attempt to add a little happiness to my morning. It’s in the prime of its life—petals the colour of sunshine unfurled and glistening with morning dew. It’s bright, cheery, and annoying. Yet warmth steals over me, ripping away my usual morning churlishness.
I force a scowl. “Do you think it worked?”
“Yes.”
His chin lifts, daring me to tell him his efforts have all been for nought.
“It’s pretty,” I mutter, reaching for my coffee. The stretch pulls on the bandages wrapped around my wrists. I wince.
Jake grabs the mug before I can reach. “Would you sit up?” he barks. “If you try drinking hot coffee while lying down, you’ll tip it all over yourself and end up with third-degree burns.”
“Oh my god, you sound like my mother.”
“For fuck’s sake. I do not,” he argues, indignant. With my beverage in one hand, Jake uses the other to shove pillows into a pile behind me, forcing me into an inclined position. Once satisfied that I’m suitably vertical, he holds out the mug. “It’s just logic and gravity.”
“Gravity, schmavity.”
Jake huffs, sitting down on the edge of my bed. “Do you always have to have the last word?”
“Of course.” I breathe on the black liquid in my mug, cooling it before taking a sip. Warmth floods my system, bringing me to life. Jake is a master at brewing the perfect blend. The coffee is strong as an ox. Black, rich, and sugar free. My toes all but curl with pleasure. “You should bring me this exact coffee in bed every day.”
“Suck my dick every day and I will.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re so crude.”
He snorts. I have everyone beat when it comes to hurlin
g obscenities, but Jake is a close second.
“Suck your own dick,” I add.
Jake reaches for a slice of bacon from the plate. “I would if I could.”
“That’s my bacon.”
He shoves the whole rasher in his mouth. Eyes flash with defiance as he chews the huge mouthful.
I glare as I sip at my coffee.
When Jake finally swallows, he says, “I made enough for two.”
He picks up the plate and sets it on my lap. Then he climbs on the bed, his big body shifting until he’s settled in beside me, our shoulders brushing.
I glance sideways. “What are you doing?”
Jake snags another rasher and gives me a wink. “Lying here with you, eating breakfast.”
“I’m not going to be abducted from my bed,” I point out as he munches his way through my food.
“I know, but I like this.”
“Like what?”
“This.” Jake waves the remainder of his bacon in a little arc over our laps, anointing my sheets with tiny droplets of grease. Then he pops it in his mouth, chews, and swallows. “Being with you.” He turns his head. It brings us so close our noses almost touch. “You smell good.”
“I’ve been in a hospital,” I argue, enjoying the interaction. I like this too. A lot. It feels … right. “I smell like antiseptic ointment and disinfected sheets.”
“No, it’s not that.” Jake leans in and rubs his nose along my neck. His breath tickles my skin. “It’s like the scent of you is plugged into some fundamental part of my brain.” His tongue snakes out, trailing a hot path toward my ear. My breath hitches when he nips at my lobe. “And the taste of you.” He pulls back, looking at me with hooded eyes. “You’re a drug, Mackenzie Valentine. One I can’t quit.”
But you did quit me.
The reminder has me crawling back inside myself.
“Don’t,” he says, his voice gruff.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t do that. Every time we get too close, you shut down and we end up fighting.”
“Because I can’t forget, Jake,” I answer honestly. “And I can’t …”
“Can’t?” he prompts.
My heart aches. “I can’t forgive,” I whisper.