by Zara Cox
Fionnella and Ellen flinch at Quinn’s roar of disbelief. I can’t stop the uncontrollable shaking that is going through me. My stalker is the stranger who tried to share my taxi when I left Blackwood Tower. God. “I…I didn’t recognize him. I have no idea who he is,” I whisper as fresh shivers rack my spine.
Quinn finally sees my reaction. He slaps the pictures on the coffee table and scoops me into his arms. His touch is gentle but the tension vibrating through him is anything but. His hand slides up and down my arm to warm me up, but his focus is fixed on the two women in the room. “What the fuck does that mean?” He points to the Post-it note stuck to the picture that says Found.
“He’s playing a game, I guess,” Ellen offers.
Lost and Found.
“Oh God!” I lay my head on his shoulder, and his arms tighten almost painfully around me.
“Fionnella, you do not fucking eat or blink or sleep until you find this asshole. I don’t care what you do—”
“I’m already on it, son.”
A look passes between them. Then he nods grimly.
“If anyone’s interested, I have a theory,” Ellen Schultz says.
“Not interested,” Quinn snaps.
“Christ, Quinn, just hear the woman out,” Fionnella grumbles.
“There might be a way to bring all of this to an end quickly.”
She outlines her plans.
* * *
Quinn
I listen in disbelief at Schultz’s sheer audacity. Did she really just say what I think she fucking said? While the reason for my existence is shaking uncontrollably in my arms?
“Let me get this straight. You want to use Elyse as bait?” I hear the echoes of carnage in my voice. I hope to hell she hears it too.
A look in her eyes tells me she sees exactly what I’m capable of. She paces a few steps away before she dares to speak. But even then, I know I won’t like what she has to say. Hell, has anything revealed to me in the last hour been comprehensible?
Elyse is being stalked. Right under my fucking nose. And she chose to keep it from me. I don’t have the capacity to think beyond the tormenting fact that I’ve failed her once again. That she chose to confide in a near-stranger rather than come to me.
All I can do now is deal with what’s in front of me. After that…God. My mind turns to ash, and I force myself back to the present.
“We need to bring this thing to an end quickly,” Ellen presses on. “He’s made contact twice in a matter of days. He’ll want to follow through—”
“In case I wasn’t clear before, the answer is hell no.”
Elyse stirs in my arms. She looks at me for a moment before she turns to the detective. “Wait. I want to do it.”
I feel like my insides are being ripped out and stomped on. “Fuck no. Are you out of your mind?” I snarl. “You’re going to stay right here until the bastard is caught.”
“Quinn, if I go into hiding, he’s just going to wait me out. I don’t want this to drag on indefinitely.”
“Jesus, did I fucking stutter? You. Are. Not. Going. To. Use. Yourself. As. Bait. End of story.”
Her lips compress for a second. “It’s not really up to you, Quinn.”
Her words flay me. Terror like I’ve never known claws through me. “No. Elyse—”
Hazel eyes snap with green fire. “It’s either this or I move to Nowhere, Alaska, find an axe-wielding lumberjack who will chop down anyone who so much as breathes my way? Is that how you want this to play out?”
Every word feels like bullets shot into me. “Be very careful, Elyse.”
“I’ll take that as a no, then? Or tell me that’s what you want and I’ll go pack my bags right now.”
I cup her face and bring it close to mine. I need her to see what she’s doing. “You want to push me over the edge, Elyse? Because you’re fucking succeeding.”
Her small hand grips my wrist hard. “I want you to accept that we can’t control everything. I want you to forgive me for fucking up. And I want us to be able to move on from it, stronger. But for now, I want you to accept that I’m doing this.”
I shake my head, wondering if I’ve fallen into a time warp where my fucked-up life is set to detonate over and over.
“She’ll have plainclothes officers with her at all times,” the detective says.
“I’ll make sure there’s additional protection too,” Fionnella adds.
The urge to tell them both to fuck off pounds through my veins. The urge to bundle up my woman in my arms, take the express elevator to the roof, and fly her far away from here is even stronger. But the implacable look in her eyes speaks for itself. What she’s suggesting will probably kill me. But what the fuck, aren’t I already dead?
I slide my arm over her shoulder and pull her close. She slides her knee over my legs and curls into me. The raging torrent inside me dials down a tiny notch.
My gaze moves from Fionnella to the detective. “If she’s doing this, I’m doing it with her. And however many security guys you intend to have on the case, you double it. Both of you. Those two things are fucking nonnegotiable. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” both women say immediately.
I should be placated. I’m even more scared than I was a second ago. “Elyse—”
The hand she lays on my chest stops me. “We’ll get through this, Quinn,” she promises.
I want to believe her. The wide, ice-cold chasm inside me won’t let me.
But I’m with her the next day, my arm thrown over her shoulders, scared out of my fucking wits, as we head across the street to Mickey’s for breakfast.
She orders a bagel with cream cheese and a white Americano. I order a black coffee. Neither of us touches our food when it arrives. Her hand finds mine on top of the table. I grip hers tight in return. But even though we connect, I feel lost.
We didn’t fuck last night. Not because I didn’t want to but because I was terrified being inside her would unravel me completely. And if ever she’s needed me to hold it together, it’s now.
Her fingers caress the back of mine. “Quinn, talk to me. Please,” she says softly.
I shake my head. “Let’s just concentrate on nailing this bastard.”
“And afterward? What happens after?”
My laugh comes out like a churning bucket of nails. “I have no fucking clue, Elyse.”
She flinches. But she doesn’t let me go. “Please tell me you get why I didn’t tell you.”
Since I spent the whole night thinking about exactly that, the answer is easy. “Yes, I get it. You didn’t think I was stable enough to handle any extra shit.”
Tears fill her eyes. “God, no, Quinn. It’s the opposite. You’re the strongest person I know. But I was being selfish. I didn’t want anything to stop us from happening, but what I failed to accept was that we need to face the bad together, the same way we celebrate the good. I was wrong to exclude you.”
The flames of hell keep licking at my insides, even as I wipe her tears away with my thumb. “I’m fucking tired of the bad, baby.”
She nods solemnly. “Me too.”
There doesn’t seem much to say after that. When the requisite time passes, I drop enough bills to cover our food, and we head back out. My skin crawls, and I want to rip apart every guy who so much as flicks a glance at Elyse. Her arm around my waist anchors me to the last thread of sanity. After five blocks, I glance down at her.
“Anything?”
She shakes her head, her eyes dark and haunted. I tug her into my arms because I can’t not. “Do you want to keep going?” I mutter, hoping she’ll say no.
“Another few blocks?”
I grit my teeth and nod, and we carry on walking. Ten blocks later, I call it. She doesn’t protest when I bundle her into the town car the moment Lionel pulls up.
For the next four days, we repeat the same pattern. On day three, Detective Schultz expresses doubt as to whether the plan is working and hypothesizes that I might be scaring the st
alker away with my presence. Her expression when I’m done speaking tells me she won’t forget my response to her bullshit any time soon. Which is great because the memory of Elyse being ripped from my arms and thrown into the back of a van by Clayton Getty isn’t one I wish to relive in this lifetime, never mind adding to it with another incident.
Fionnella wisely removes the detective from my presence, and we return to the status quo.
We’re both climbing proverbial walls, and I feel Elyse’s anxiety every time I touch her. I want to rip and maim and shatter, but absurdly, it’s Elyse’s quiet strength that keeps me together. I sit beside her when a sketch artist arrives to take a description of her assailant, and I shamelessly snarl at Fionnella and Detective Schultz every time they come up empty.
The shit hits the fan on Monday morning.
“Tell me you’re fucking joking, Elyse.” I glare at her across the kitchen island.
She raises her stubborn, gorgeous chin. “No, I’m not. I’m going to class. I’ve already missed too much.”
The coffee I just swallowed feels like acid burning in my gut. I round the island to stand in front of her. Dressed in my Springsteen T-shirt and nothing else, she’s so small. Vulnerable. But oh-so-fucking fierce. I want to wrap her up in my arms and lock her away. She wants to soar.
Compromise. Jesus, that fucking word.
“Please. Reconsider.” The words scorch my throat.
She sets her own coffee cup down and slides her arms around my waist. The feel of her body against mine adds an instant layer of insanity to the volatile mix. We haven’t fucked for almost a week—everything we have is focused on getting through this. That’s a record for us. One I don’t think I can hold for much longer without breaking in some other catastrophic way. Especially with the added shit Elyse is throwing my way.
“I’m not going to let him disrupt my life. But I know we have an agreement, so you can come with me, if you want.”
“If I want?” I stress darkly. “You think you can fucking stop me?”
“No.”
And that’s the end of it. We head for the shower, and I torture myself with washing her body without fucking her. She bites her lip while returning the favor. By the time we dry off, we’re breathing like we’ve run a fucking marathon, and I contemplate giving in, letting the madness take me.
Her instructor sends me a puzzled look when I trail her into the class but wisely doesn’t comment on my presence. I drown him out when he starts a monologue about commercial leases and fix my stare on Elyse. She’s listening intently, her pen resting against her lower lip.
God, she’s beautiful.
Several days ago when all this shit started, I’d dared to question where we went from there. The answer is what it’s always been. I’m not leaving her side. Not for one fucking second. She’s finding her wings, and I’m holding the clippers that could sever them. A better man would’ve let her go.
I’m not, and never will be, a better man.
She may be ripping my insides out, but I don’t have a choice. I love her. I love everything she is, even when she’s driving me nuts.
She stops scribbling on her pad and looks over at me. Whatever she sees in my face makes her eyes widen. We stare at each other for fuck knows how long. Until a throat clears.
“Miss Gilbert? Are you with us?”
She flushes and breaks eye contact. I glare at the instructor. Fucking asshole.
“You’re going to get me thrown off the course if you keep glaring at my instructor,” she grumbles in my ear as I walk her out during her break.
“I live in hope,” I grunt.
“Quinn!”
“He tries to throw you out, I’ll eat him for fucking breakfast.”
She sighs, but I feel her relax beneath the hand I have on her waist. When we hit the corridor, she turns to me. “I need the ladies’ room. Do you mind getting me a soda?” She nods to the vending machine at the end of the hall.
The signs for the bathroom are at the opposite end. Too far. “No. I’ll wait for you to be done in the bathroom, and we’ll get your soda together. Better yet, I’ll have Lionel bring you a selection.”
She stops me from pulling my phone from my pocket. “Quinn, I don’t need you to get your driver to bring me a soda. And you can’t come with me to the bathroom. Relax, I’ll be fine.” She leans up and kisses me on the cheek before she hurries away.
My every instinct is to rush after her. But I lock my knees and stay put until she disappears into the ladies’ room. I jog to the vending machine and slip a ten-dollar bill into the slot. I press the button for a Dr Pepper, her favorite. Nothing happens. I stab the button again. And again. Give it a kick for good measure.
A student stops next to me. “Dude, that machine’s been broken like…forever. The one upstairs works okay, though. I think.”
I nod my thanks at the guy as I walk away. A glance down the corridor shows no sign of Elyse. Since I have no intention of leaving this floor, I start to pull my phone from my pocket to summon Lionel on a soda run only to freeze when two solidly built guys charge through the stairway door to my left. Another door at the end of the hallway bursts open, and a woman darts through. I don’t need X-ray vision to spot the gun bulging beneath her navy jacket.
“He’s here,” she hisses to the two guys as she reaches for her holster.
My world turns bright red, and I’m sprinting for the door Elyse went through before my brain completely kicks in.
I rush past the two guys who’re peering into classrooms. The woman spots me and her eyes widen. “Mr. Blackwood—”
“She’s in there!” I point to the bathroom as I launch my body at the door. It doesn’t budge. “Fuck! Elyse!”
There’s no sound from inside. I step back and aim my booted foot at the top of the door handle. The pain barely registers, but the door gives way a little. Another vicious kick and it splinters away from the lock.
I hear a whimper and a scuffle from a closed cubicle, and my heart stops. “Elyse!”
The cubicle door is far easier to kick in, or I’m probably just that much more out of my head for the pain to register. I shove aside the shattered wood and see the mountain in front of me, with his beefy hands around her neck.
“You killed him, you fucking bitch! You killed my brother. Now I’m going to kill you,” he growls.
I’m don’t recall what happens next. All I know is, by the time I’m dragged away, by the time I have Elyse’s warm body in my arms again, my fists are raw and the front of my shirt is covered in blood.
Chapter Eleven
Lucky/Q
You killed my brother…
The words blaze across my mind through the trip to the hospital and the medical exams and police reports. I remember it every time I swallow and my bruised throat protests at my near-strangulation at Deacon Matthews’s hands.
Turns out Deacon was in prison for assault and battery when I shot and killed his younger brother, Ridge, in self-defense last year. The moment Deacon was released a month ago, he came after me. His re-arrest for violation of his parole meant he was back in prison before nightfall on Monday, even before fresh charges for his assault on me were brought.
But a week after the incident, I still can’t get the words out of my head. I can’t shake the melancholy weighing me down. I knew taking a life would be a burden I’d have to live with the rest of my life, but I didn’t think it would become this recurring nightmare.
Quinn is worried out of his mind. He called a board meeting first thing on Tuesday and temporarily handed over the reins of Blackwood Estates to his vice president, after which there was a press release announcing he was taking a leave of absence.
He never stopped to regroup after all the shit that happened with his father and stepmother and me last year. And with every adversity that’s been piled on us since then, we’re both at the breaking point. I understand his need to take a step back from it all. And although that means I’ve become his sole project
, I can’t even summon the enthusiasm to find out whether I’m pleased or worried about it.
Jets of hot water stream over me as I stand, head bowed, in the shower. I have no idea what day or time it is. I know I’m healing because the bruises around my throat have faded. Beyond that, nothing much registers.
The door opens behind me, and I hear Quinn enter. The sound of a bottle opening precedes the slide of gel-filled hands over my body. My nipples pucker, and heat flows through my body, but the heavy weight in my head stops me from moving, from enjoying his touch.
“Elyse.” His voice is low and deep. I still love the sound of it enough to close my eyes and absorb it.
“Hmm?”
His arms slide around me, pulling me against him. “Sweetheart, are you all right?”
I nod woodenly.
“Please look at me when you say that.”
I attempt to lift my head, but I give up and shake it instead.
He doesn’t say a word. In silence, he finishes washing me and then dries me off. When we leave the shower, he drapes a bathrobe over me before he throws one on himself. I faintly register that as not normal. Hell, I didn’t even know we owned bathrobes.
When we walk into the bedroom, I know why.
Three members of the concierge staff are moving briskly between our dressing rooms and the bedroom, piling clothes and accessories into suitcases.
“What…what’s going on?”
He links our fingers and brings them up to his mouth. His lips graze my knuckles as he stares at me. “We’ve both had enough of New York for a while, I think. So pick a destination. Anywhere in the world and I’ll take us there.”
I look from his pleading, captivating face to the organized chaos around us. I think of all the places I dreamed of visiting a million years ago. I can’t summon even one. I shake my head. “I can’t…”
“It’s okay. I’ve got this. I’ve got us.” The way he stresses the last word makes my heart jump a little, but I’m still lost in my head when he leads us out of the bedroom. There are two more staff members going through the apartment gathering stuff. We wander to the living room, where one of the catering staff is setting out a tray of what looks like a Spanish tapas meal. I look out the window and notice the sun’s setting.
