“Do you know anything about pelicans?”
Callan scowled, sick of the theatrics. “When do I get to see Innis again?”
“When I say so. Pelicans. Do you know anything about them?”
His molars locked. “No.”
“Impressive creatures, solely devoted to those they love. They’ll do anything for their wee hatchlings.”
He returned to the table, opening a leather duffle and dropping the weapons inside one by one.
“Pelicans are so intensely led by responsibility they’ve been known to pierce their own breast and sacrifice their lives to save those in their care. They bleed from the heart, literally, to deliver sustenance to their young when food is scarce, even if it eventually kills them.”
He handed the bag to a guard, delivering quick instructions for the others to gather the weapons that wouldnae fit. Two men left the room.
Rory folded his arms over his chest and leaned into the wall, facing Callan. “Spiritually, pelicans are the tortured heroes. Patient and wise, with an intimate knowledge of suffering. But like Jesus to the cross, Socrates to poison, and Joan of Arc to the flame, mortality remains an insoluble failing. Do you understand what I’m telling you, MacGregor? Do you know why the pelican bleeds?”
He drew in a measured breath, reminding himself that he was at this psychopath’s mercy as long as he wanted to see Innis again. “Duty and love.”
“Yes. And the moral of the story, my darling boy, is that love will always be fatal. You are the pelican, MacGregor. And I own everything you love. For them, and for me, ye will bleed.”
Chapter Fifteen
Saratoga Springs, New York—America
Present Day
“Thank you. I’ll let her know.”
Emery came awake, reluctance keeping her eyelids pressed tight, but it was too late. She blinked, still at the clinic.
“Good morning,” Callan said, voice soft. He’d finally settled into a chair, but pulled it back from the bed. Maybe he was afraid to get too close.
“Morning.” Good was up for debate.
“That was Officer Knowles on the phone. They have him in custody. No issues.”
The subtlety of his words vanished with crushing significance. The earth didn’t shake and time moved on, but somewhere in the midst of her sleep, they’d apprehended the maker of her nightmares.
And he went quietly, like a sinking pebble into a placid pond. Hardly a ripple at all.
A thousand little needles punched through her skin as she tried to make sense of the hush-hush way this monster drifted into custody when, to her, he’d been the most unstoppable force she’d ever met.
She expected a bigger splash. It didn’t seem real without one.
“He’s been arrested? He’s in jail?” She hadn’t expected it to happen so fast—so easily.
She frowned. Why hadn’t he run? Was she just another broken piece of coral shamelessly stolen from an otherwise perfect reef that he’d take no accountability for destroying?
“They want you to sign a statement. So they can charge him.” Purple shadows showed beneath Callan’s eyes.
“Have you slept?”
He shook his head. “I’m not one for sleepin’ much.”
Yet, exhaustion showed in his face and posture. “You don’t have to stay.”
“I know it. I’m here because I want to be.”
Despite her gaping sorrow and guilt for hijacking his night, she smiled. “Thank you.”
“No need to thank me. When we leave here, I’ll go with you to the station.”
She felt like she was missing something. “Is something wrong?”
His lips formed a grim line. “If a judge grants him bail, they can only hold him for a short time. Statistically, white, privileged men escape legal situations with ... leaner consequences than most in this country.”
“Oh, God.” Betrayal stabbed into her heart. “How long can they hold him?”
“He’ll need to go before a judge, and maybe—given the medical report—they’ll hold him without bail.”
She shook her head. At this point, even emotional coddling abraded. “He’ll get bail, and someone will pay it.” He seeped charm, privilege, and entitlement. Those things came with connections.
“I’m sorry, love. It’s just the way of things no matter how wrong it is.”
She sat up, her body protesting in ways that felt foreign. “But it just happened. We haven’t been to court.” She knew very little about the justice process, but this felt innately wrong. This was a dangerous man they were letting go.
“Until convicted, he’s technically innocent. They can hold him on charges, but most likely a judge will grant him the right to post bail. They’ll get him on charges of battery and aggravated assault, too, but this is his first offense.”
Fury boiled inside of her. Like he was some sort of a boy scout! “Did they send over all my medical reports?”
“The polis have everything.”
Her brow tightened, the sense of fighting a losing battle overwhelming her before the war even began. “It doesn’t seem fair.”
“No,” he agreed, but it was clear there was nothing they could do.
Her head hung. “I guess I need a lawyer.”
“They’ll supply a prosecutor, but having an advocate on yer side is always a good idea. We can ask around for a recommendation.”
Her side? “Everything’s moving so fast.” And yet, she felt like she’d been waiting in this room forever.
“Ye have time. First, he’ll have an arraignment. The trial willnae come until later, dependin’ on how he pleads.”
How was he so informed about the legal system? He wasn’t even a natural citizen. “Did you have to learn about our legal system when you got your citizenship?”
He shifted in the chair and folded the coat draped over his thighs. “Something like that.”
She ate some crackers and drank a glass of apple juice for breakfast. She couldn’t bring herself to touch any of the other food they brought.
Her appetite wasn’t the issue, chewing was. Her jaw pulsed and her eardrum kept clicking and crackling. The doctors said one of the blows had ruptured it. Callan said it would hurt less in a day or two. It was only one of her injuries, but enough to make her miserable.
Pushing her breakfast tray away, she huffed. “I can’t eat anymore. My face is killing me.” She pressed on her ear. Nothing helped.
“You’re lucky it burst. The pressure’s the painful part. Now, it’s just gotta heal.”
“Are you also an ear expert?”
He pointed to the side of his head. “Ye dinnae get ears like this without learnin’ a thing or two about the pain.”
It was the first time she ever really looked at his ears. At a quick glance, they looked like everyone else’s. But now she saw the misshapen curve and the way the center swelled unnaturally.
Her breath hitched. It looked painful. “What happened to you?”
He faced her, eyes creased with a forced smile that seemed plastic. “I used to get into a lot of scraps in Scotland.”
“Fights?”
He nodded but didn’t elaborate.
“We don’t have to talk about it.”
His gaze shifted away. “Maybe someday.”
She bit another cracker. As her stare dropped to his hands. “Is that...”
He looked at her, and she swallowed, remembering her manners.
“Never mind.”
“What were ye gonna ask?”
She tried to make something up, but couldn’t bring herself to lie to him. She tipped her chin. “Your hands. Are they like that from fighting?”
He closed his fists. “Some.”
Her gaze traced the scars on his face and neck, knowing each one by heart. She glanced at the thick muscle roped around his forearm. Heavy veins and corded sinew, under a masculine dusting of black hair.
Just beneath his elbow, stretching only a few inches from his wrist, was a so
rt of scarred band, little markings forming several columns and rows, wrapping around his arm. Unlike his other scars, these appeared intentional.
“What’s that?”
The misshapen fingers of his right hand covered the tracks. “These are off limits.”
His words chilled the air between them. She instantly regretted her curiosity and knew she’d never ask about the band of scars again. But her mind wouldn’t stop wondering.
Had someone done that to him? Was he abused as a child? They looked too ... new. What did they mean and why did the last row stop in the middle? The pattern looked unfinished.
Eventually, a daytime nurse arrived delivering a jogging suit. The police had taken her other clothes for evidence. She didn’t have shoes with her, so she slipped on a pair of hospital socks, the good kind with the foot grips.
When it was time to go, a sense of displacement overcame her. They didn’t have a car, because they arrived by ambulance. No shoes, no car, no purse. She was a balloon let go from its string, and gravity had no hold on her.
Callan’s hand brushed to her back, hardly touching but enough to keep her moving. “I’ve called for a car.”
Thank God he was there. She could barely find her way out of the clinic.
She’d never used an Uber, and it felt strange sitting in the back of someone’s family van, baby books stuffed in the pocket behind the seat, the scent of dried Cheerios and artificial strawberries suspended in the air.
The entire drive was surreal. She didn’t have to talk. Couldn’t think of words.
Callan sat beside her, the empty middle seat wearing a dusting of crumbs from the family that owned the car. She kept her head down and studied him, staring under her lashes at his thick thighs and long legs.
He could be so still. So powerful.
She drew so much from his strength. This nightmare could have been a thousand times worse if he hadn’t been there. And he was still here, by her side.
Without thinking, she reached across the middle seat and turned her palm upward, opening her hand.
He glanced down, and then back to her face, a silent battle unraveling in his eyes. She peeked down, and back to him.
His chest lifted on a slow breath.
He moved in slow increments, his crooked fingers coming to rest in hers. Warm. Secure. Right. She managed a tiny smile and closed her fingers around his.
Chapter Sixteen
Riordan Private Estate
Lower Whitecraigs, Edinburgh—Scotland
Four Years Prior
“I want to talk to her—alone,” Callan barked.
“What do you suggest I do with your friend?” Rory asked, seeming not at all surprised by his demand.
“He can stay.”
He drew in a breath and gave Rhys a measuring, seemingly unimpressed look. “Wonderful. Another leech.” He waved a hand at Callan, addressing the guards that returned, “Remove the chains.”
As they stripped away the weight of heavy metal, his body sagged with relief. Rory folded his hands at the base of his back and stood in front of him, placing his face directly in his.
“You understand what’s at stake. Betray me, and I’ll make it hurt in ways you’ve never imagined.” He let the warning settle over him. “I’ll hurt her.”
He wanted to spit in his face, bite off his nose. “I understand.”
“Good.” Rory unfolded his body and removed his knife, cutting away the ropes.
Callan’s body thrummed. He could attack, take his knife and ram it into Rory’s jugular. Disarm the remaining guards, snapping each of their necks then rescue Rhys and go find Innis.
“Dinnae be foolish,” Rory warned, meeting his gaze. “I welcome a reason to make her scream.”
He squelched his murderous desires and forced his will into submission. A silent beat passed where they all seemed to hold their collective breath.
Finally, Rory nodded—satisfied. “I’ll leave ye alone now. Have fun.”
The second the door closed, Rhys screamed behind the tape. Callan’s stiff legs protested as he stood. His body wobbled, the blood rushing into his limbs and out of his brain. The scarring on the soles of his feet hindered his balance as he staggered into the cinderblock wall.
Rhys grunted, urging him on. Clinging to his prone body, Callan ripped the tape off Rhys’s mouth.
“Bleedin’ Christ! Get me off this fuckin’ wall.”
He shoved a shoulder into Rhys’s stomach and hoisted him upward, stretching to unhook the rope from the peg. His full weight toppled them to the ground.
“I’m going to kill that dirty fuck!” Rhys hissed, moaning and wincing as the blood likely flooded his extremities in a storm of stinging pins and needles.
“Not before I do.” Callan shoved him off and caught his breath. He dinnae have a knife to cut his mate’s hands free.
They worked together to unknot the rope, unraveling it quickly, and then they both stilled. Reality crashed over them at exactly the same time, wiping them clear off the grid of sanity and leaving them stranded on an island of lunacy.
“Did you see what he did to her?” Rhys breathed, a tortured glaze overtaking his green eyes.
“He’ll pay.”
“He took her fuckin’ eye, Callan. She was perfect, and he ruined her.”
He shoved his friend. “He dinnae ruin her! She’s still Innis.” A vise closed around his chest. “She’s still...”
Had he broken her? How much of her actually remained?
“We need to speak to her. Until we get her talkin’, we dinnae ken anything.”
“Aye,” Rhys agreed. “He’s got to be holdin’ somethin’ over her. Why else would she stay?”
“He’s full of shite. He’ll not let her leave. She’s a fuckin’ prisoner here.” He forced his legs to bend and slowly stood, helping Rhys off the ground.
“Do ye think he was lyin’ about Gavin?”
Callan swallowed. He couldnae fool himself into hoping his baby brother was still alive. And if he was here, that wasnae exactly a better status than death. “I dinnae ken.”
Rory was a psychotic son of a bitch, but he seemed dangerously candid. Brutally honest and unflinchingly cruel. If he said he dinnae have Gavin, Callan was tempted to believe him. And he despised that fine thread of trust, hated that he already knew the man well enough to believe anything out of his mouth.
“I dinnae think he’s here,” he finally said. “Wishin’ he was, is a selfish wish. What good would it do him to be trapped in this hell? God took mercy on his soul when he removed him from this world. Nothin’ but ugliness.”
Rhys quieted.
“When Innis gets here, we’ll find out what we can,” Callan said, not wanting to get overly introspective about Gavin at a time like this. “Then I want ye to take her away from here. Go as fast and as far as ye can get. Just keep runnin’ until ye hit the ocean. Take her where even I cannae find her. That way we know Rory willnae.”
“I have no money te go anywhere.”
“Under my mattress, at yer place, there’s about eighty pounds and some quid. That should get ye as far as Dublin. Do whatever ye need to do to get more, but do it quietly. No matter what, dinnae use your real names.” Her missing eye would give her away. “Try to keep her out of sight.”
“What names do we use?”
“Fergus and Uma Stewart.” It was their parents’ names, their mother’s maiden name.
“Aye. That’ll work.” Rhys rubbed the tension out of his neck. “Will ye be far behind?”
“I’ll do what he asks for a time. Then, when he least expects it, I’ll slit his fuckin’ throat. Only when he and all his men are dead will I come for you and Innis.”
“Maybe we should just run—the three of us. If ye kill him, people will be lookin’ for ye.”
“They’ll all be dead.”
A shuffle sounded from the hall, and Callan held up a hand, silencing Rhys. He reached for his knife, forgetting his weapons were gone.
Pressing a finger to his lips, he motioned for Rhys to get to the other side of the room, the better to defend themselves against anyone wishing them harm. The heavy door creaked, and he held his breath. Pressure, with the weight of an anvil, slammed into his chest as Innis’s lithe form filled the doorway.
He exhaled roughly, and she flinched when he crossed the space in two strides. Her face angled toward the floor, and her hair, again, struck him as surprisingly clean for a hostage.
His raw voice sliced down to a thin breath as he rasped her name. “Innis.” But she still wouldnae meet his gaze.
Rhys moved forward, his courage to touch her outweighing Callan’s. Hands shaking, he lifted her chin and stared into her damaged face.
A tear carved a wet track down Rhys’s bloodied face. “Oh, Innis...” A patch now covered her missing eye, and he traced a finger over the black canvas. “What has he done to you?”
Her lips compressed, and her good eye screwed shut, tears dampening her lashes. Her shoulders quaked, and her sorrow brought him bitter relief. If she heard and recognized them, the damage might only be on the outside.
“Easy, beauty.” Rhys pulled her close, but her arms dinnae lift from her sides.
This moment, it wasnae his. She was his beloved sister, but as she leaned into his friend’s arms, Callan understood the truth of things he never wanted to acknowledge. He finally saw the heartache of all the pain and hurt Rhys had suffered since the fire.
Innis’s weak sobs tore at Callan’s heart. Rhys pressed his lips to her hair, breathed promises into her ears, and held her with such gentle possession Callan could only see the purity of his friend’s love.
“My heart hasnae beat right since I lost ye.”
Her delicate sniffles pitched in a strange tenor like she’d somehow forgotten how to cry. “I couldnae get away.”
“Hush. You did what you needed to do, beauty. I’m here now.”
She nodded, edging away from Rhys but his grip noticeably tightened. “It’s not safe.”
“I dinnae care.” He kissed her again, and Callan drew back, feeling like an unwelcome voyeur and drawing Rhys’s attention. “Your brother...”
Hurt (The Hurt Series, #1) Page 14
