by Em Petrova
He strode to the cupboard and pulled down a plate. As he spooned the chicken and thick cream sauce with pasta onto it, his phone buzzed.
Sister Madeline. Fucking woman never shut down, did she?
Her text flashed onto the screen, and he stared at it for five full seconds before the words registered.
What was the call your ward took?
“Call,” he grated out, and it sounded loud in the silence of the kitchen. “Goddammit!”
Rule number four: Never trust a ward to have her own safety in mind.
Okay, so he made that one up, but it damn well pertained to the situation.
He tossed down the spoon and whirled. Each stride to Sloane’s room, he mashed his teeth harder. When he reached for the door handle, a growl erupted from him.
Locked.
He raised a fist and pounded the door until it rattled in the frame. “Sloane! Open this door!”
No answer met his ears.
“Last chance, woman! Open the goddamn door!”
He glared at the unmoving handle.
“Have it your way then. I’m coming in.” He didn’t want to enter by using his microchip, yet she left him with no choice. He crisscrossed his wrist over the lock, and it clicked open.
One sweep of the room showed him it was empty. He stormed to the bathroom, but she wasn’t there either.
Quickly, he strode through the house, head swinging side to side in search of his ward. At the front door, he saw her, faced away from him, bent over something. When he approached, he saw her hand deep in his jacket pocket.
“Sloane,” he barked.
She spun, lips parted, color draining from her face before flooding in again, dark red.
“Didn’t you hear me calling for you? Or busting into your room?”
“Uh, no.”
He scanned her, head to toe and back up. Unharmed, but up to something, and he didn’t fucking like it. “What are you searching for in my jacket pockets?”
She clamped her fingers into a small fist. “Nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me again, Miss Sailor. You’re looking for car keys, aren’t you?”
She lifted her chin a notch and stared him in the eyes. “What makes you think that?”
He bit off a roar and grasped her shoulder, focusing hard on keeping his touch soft enough so as not to bruise her.
If I mark her, it won’t be with violence.
Christ, where did that thought even derive from? Hell if he knew what came over him. Steering her away from the front door, he nudged her toward the sofa. “Sit down. We’re having a talk.”
Her brown eyes flashed with defiant amber sparks, but she dropped to the sofa and folded her hands.
“First, I’m going to make it clear that I do not tolerate a liar. Do you understand me, Sloane?”
“I’m not a child to be punished.”
“Then stop acting like one.”
Her stare hardened, eyes narrowing on him and mouth twisting in that way that had him feeling her lips beneath his all over again. Hell, he still felt her on his fingers, the muscle of her shoulder strong, virile…far from delicate.
She could handle his questioning without crumbling, she’d proved that much already.
“You took a call earlier. Who called you, Sloane?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t take a call.”
“But one came in.”
She held his gaze, not budging.
“Fine—we’ll do this the hard way. Hand over your phone.”
“No. It’s my private property. You—”
“Hand it over or I’ll frisk you for it.”
Her eyes flared with surprise. When she didn’t respond to his threat, he had no choice but to follow through. In one step, he reached her and yanked her to her feet. Starting at her shoulders, he curled his fingers around her body and began to glide them downward.
Hell, she smelled of those wildflowers he took note of in her bedroom, and he was nearing her sides. One brush of his knuckles over the outer curves of her breasts and he’d be as hard as a rock.
“Stop. Here it is.” She reached into her pocket and slammed the device into his hand.
Just getting his microchip close to the phone had her screen going haywire, revealing everything but the color of her panties to him.
I can still find that out.
Cutting off the errant thought, he read the number and all the information tracing the call.
“This is a burn phone.” He lifted his head and pinned her in his stare.
“I…don’t know what a burn phone is.”
“Untraceable number, one you buy minutes for and can toss away.” He took one step closer to her, forcing her to crane her neck to look at him. “I’ll remind you that I do not tolerate lies. Now tell me who called you.”
“I don’t know. A telemarketer?” Sarcasm dripped from her tongue.
“Do I need to remind you that you’re being hunted? That there’s a very angry group of people who want to see you pay for the upheaval they’re facing and the fact they’re losing millions of dollars a day? These bastards don’t have a problem making you into bait for the sharks in the Gulf of Mexico.”
“This will all blow over. As soon as they realize I didn’t have anything to do with their workers walking off the job—”
He put his hands on her but narrowly kept from shaking her to wake her up. Dipping his head, he stared into her eyes, trying to convey his point. “You…are…not…safe. And you received a phone call. That could get not only you killed, but me killed too. Do you want to lose your life or have my blood on your hands, woman?”
A small noise broke from her. She shook her head.
“Good. Now tell me what the hell is going on and why you’re sneaking around searching my coat pockets.”
With a display of more strength than he expected, she shoved away from him and stumbled off. Anger gathered in his chest, and he opened his mouth to expel it, when she pasted a hand to her face and issued a throaty cry.
Was she just acting again? Christ, he needed to talk to Madeline, and this time he’d let her convince him to return to HQ and his maps. A screen couldn’t cry, lie or drive him up a fucking wall the way this ward did.
“Sloane.” Her name rolled off his tongue with an edge of warning.
“Fine! I’ll tell you, but only because I don’t have any time to waste.”
He waited, but he was far from patient.
She sucked in another shaky breath, and a tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m involved in something else.”
He closed the gap between them and grasped her by the forearm. “What?”
“There’s a girl. I have to save her. There isn’t much time, and we’re farther away than I probably think we are. Please—just, can’t we go and I’ll tell you on the way?”
“No,” he said firmly.
“You unmoving ass! Your stopping me from reaching her means she’ll be raped or beaten or—”
He grabbed on to her other arm. “Who? What is going on?”
“Please.” This time her brown eyes simmered with a fear that in no way could be an act.
He released her and ran a hand over his hair, shoving away the loose strands. He had one duty—to keep Sloane out of harm. From what she said, though…someone else was in trouble, and that tapped into a whole other level of commitment to this woman.
“Get your stuff. We’re leaving.”
With a squeak of relief, Sloane took off to the bedroom, while he walked to the door and grabbed his jacket. When he returned, he took the bag from her and thrust the jacket into her hands. “Put this on. The mountains are cold at night.”
He checked the area with a glance before allowing Sloane outside, and then with a firm hold on her arm, he led her to the car. Once he started the engine and stomped the gas, he threw Sloane a look.
“Now what the fuck is going on?” he commanded.
“Just drive south. I’ll tell you
the exit when we reach it.”
“Sloane, we made a deal that you’d tell me—” In the front pocket of his jeans, her phone vibrated. He leaned back to fish it free and then took his eyes off the road to stare at the screen.
She snatched the device from his hands and gasped. “We’re closer than I thought. Head east as soon as you see a route sign.” Her thumbs flew over the keyboard, and he made a grab for the phone, but she curled forward around it, keeping it from him.
“I need this. It’s my only lifeline to this girl!”
“What girl?” he practically bellowed.
“Her name’s Lauren. She’s fifteen, and she’s in trouble!”
“Jesus Christ.” He saw a sign for an eastbound highway and took the turn at high speed. “At least tell me how far out this girl is.” Adrenaline pumped through his system, and he slowed his breathing to control it.
“Uh…my source says just outside of Cooper’s Crossing.”
“Your source!”
“Yes. Please, North, just drive. I can’t think when you’re raging at me.” Her hands shook and she stared down at her phone, which remained dark and silent in her hands.
What the actual fuck was going on? He should turn this car around right now. His first and only goal was to keep his ward safe. He hadn’t taken on the rescue of another girl.
Yet…she was fifteen. And if he didn’t reach her, unspeakable things would happen, or so Sloane told him. With little choice but to drive, he laid on the gas and held his tongue.
Ten minutes turned into twenty and then thirty. When Sloane raised a hand and waved it at the big sign looming up out of the darkness, he read the words Cooper’s Crossing. They hit eighty miles per hour.
“Where is the place? Where am I going?” He threw her a look.
“There’s a road to the right, he says.”
“He?”
“Yes, dammit! Just follow my directions!” The harsh tone of her voice would impress many a man, but he wasn’t certain if he felt impressed or pissed off.
“Turn here,” she said, pointing to a dark break between trees. “And cut your lights.”
“Jesus Christ.” Was she driving them into an ambush? He reached along his spine and pulled out his weapon.
“We shouldn’t need that, not unless her husband’s awake.”
“Husband? She’s fifteen, you said.”
“Exactly! Now be quiet. I need to see… Yes, there.” She straightened in her seat. “That glimmer of blue is the moonlight on the metal roof of the house. He’s got her inside.” A harsh laugh escaped her. “They always have to go to sleep sometime, and that’s when I go in.”
North jerked his head to stare at her. “What the hell, woman?”
“Don’t ask. Not yet. We’re close. Stop here but leave the car running. I’ll be back.” She reached for the door handle, and he locked his hand over her forearm in a death grip.
“Like hell you’re going anywhere without me.”
“All right, but you have to be silent and swift.”
Fuck, did she even know who she was speaking to? Irritation sped through him.
She twisted her arm free of his hold and slipped out of the car. He jumped out too and ran around the side.
“There aren’t any dogs, not that Tobias reported to me,” she whispered as if to herself as she rushed into the darkness.
He kept up with her, an arm thrown out as he prepared to whisk her out of harm’s way at even a cricket’s chirp. The house rose out of the shadows, rundown with a couple steps leading to a back door. As Sloane made a run for these, North grabbed her.
“Tell me where to look and I’ll go in.”
Her eyes glistened in the moonlight as she stared up at him. “There should be a door on the right.”
“Where does it lead?”
“To the basement.”
Fucking hell.
There was no way to take her inside with him and keep her safe, and no way to let her stay outside alone. He threw a look around the dark yard and only saw a few lawn ornaments and a junk car near the tree line. He had no choice.
“Don’t move. Stay here until I come out with her. Understand?”
She nodded.
He pinched her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “Say it.”
“I understand.” Her voice came out as a whisper of a murmur.
He gave her one last glare and then entered the home, weapon raised.
The next minutes blurred in his mind when he thought on it later. All he remembered was breaching a basement and the twist of horror in his gut when he spotted the girl tied to a bedframe and curled up on a soiled mattress. The place reeked, and she stunk of fear and sweat. But North severed her rope bonds and scooped her into his arms.
In silence, he ran the stairs with her and hit the back door with only a glance over his shoulder. As soon as Sloane spotted them, she issued a rasping cry, which she quickly swallowed.
They ran.
At the car, Sloane opened the door for him, and he settled the young girl inside. He had no recollection of jumping behind the wheel or driving away from the place, until Sloane said, “You can turn your headlights on now, North.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, woman. What the…” He tossed a look over the seat at the girl weeping there. He didn’t need daylight to know she bore bruises. And he’d smelled the blood on her.
Sloane reached over the seat and touched the girl. “It’s okay, sweetheart. You’re safe now. You’re never going back to him.”
She didn’t speak, only wept.
After North put a solid ten miles between them and that hellish house, he pulled off to the side of the road.
“What are you doing?” Sloane asked.
“I need to talk to you.”
She threw the girl a look and then slipped from the car. He circled it and grabbed Sloane by the hand, pulling her several feet from the vehicle.
“What the hell did I just do?” He wanted to shake her and kiss her at the same damn time, and that didn’t make a lick of sense.
She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. “You just rescued her from a marriage she was forced into—sold into.”
His stomach turned, and bile burned at the base of his throat. “You’re fucking kidding me.”
She shook her head. “I wish I was.”
“Why are you involved? Do you know this girl?”
“No. I just…help girls like her when I can.”
He gaped at her. And no—she had not just wrapped his small fist around his heartstrings and yanked it. He would not get emotionally involved. Wasn’t that rule four? Hell, he couldn’t remember now.
“You’re a Hollywood star. Why are you making this your concern?” he asked.
She pivoted toward the car to where the abused girl sat, and then swayed back to him. Her eyes gleamed. “Because these are my people, not those Hollywood types. I came from this place, and I won’t let my sisters go down without fighting for them.”
* * * * *
Sloane embraced Lauren, and the girl brought her arms up around her. The wetness of her tears seeped into Sloane’s sleeve, but she didn’t care.
Off to the side of the room, North looked on. Their gazes met, and she saw he was affected by this entire experience—the hard expression she’d seen from him before had been erased sometime during the night.
When she pulled from the embrace, Sloane smoothed Lauren’s pale brown hair off her face. “You’re going to be all right. This place is the best.”
The therapy center had received a lot of Sloane’s money over the course of the year she’d spent saving young women. They not only provided a safe haven, a place of rest, but all the support the girl would need to get her life back. From self-esteem to dealing with trauma, this place really did it all.
“I can’t thank you enough for saving me from that…that…” Lauren fumbled, and North took a step forward.
Sloane put out a hand to hold him off while directing her at
tention to the young woman. “You don’t need to thank me. Just concentrate on you right now, and on getting better, okay?”
She nodded. In the rear of the room, a counselor waited to take it from here. Sloane pulled Lauren into another hug and squeezed her gently. “If you need anything, just tell somebody and we’ll find it for you.”
“I will.” She sniffled as they broke apart. With a watery smile, Lauren turned to the counselor and left the room.
For a minute, Sloane watched, her heart in her throat. If only she could do the same for her sister. If only she could find her.
In a moment alone, she asked Lauren if she ever heard of Scarlett, and she almost knew the answer before Lauren responded—Scarlett was still lost to her.
She drew in a deep breath that burned her lungs. A soft touch on her shoulder drew her around. North stood there looking down at her, his expression unreadable.
“Come on. Let’s get you safe now.”
She roused at his statement. After the ordeal of rescuing Lauren and then installing her here in the facility, she managed to forget about the dangers she faced.
With a nod, she followed him out of the building. He checked and double-checked the area before allowing her to walk out into the open, and then he assisted her into the car.
The landscape flew by, and she didn’t question where they were headed—her mind remained far away, in a small, unkempt home on the day her sister had disappeared. The memories of the fight she had with her father that day would forever live in her mind. While she sped past most of the argument, one thing always stood out to her—when he told her she would never see her sister again, because she was a married woman now and belonged to another family.
North touched her arm. Jolting, she looked at him.
Concern pinched his sandy brows together. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” Her dry mouth prevented her from saying more, even if she had anything to add.
“You sighed just now.”
“I didn’t realize.”
He grew quiet then, and she was absorbed in her own thoughts. When the car stopped, she raised her head to focus on her surroundings.
