by Naima Simone
Another silence filled the connection. Then, “So it’s like that, huh?” Mal asked rhetorically, then chuckled. “We figured after the meeting.” A pause. “She’s good for you—she loves you.”
“Yeah.” A memory of Leah laying her heart down on the bed between them wavered, faded. “Hopefully I’m good enough for her.”
Malachim grunted. “You’re not. But go after her anyway.”
Gabriel smiled. “Thanks. I’ll hit you back for the name.”
He disconnected the call and immediately dialed her number. He listened as the phone rang, but Leah didn’t answer. Her voice mail clicked on, requesting he leave a message, but he hung up. She probably didn’t want to hear from him, and he couldn’t blame her. Didn’t mean he would accept it though.
He redialed, but again, voice mail. He frowned. She always answered her phone when he called—always. Okay, yeah, they were in a tough, awkward spot right now, but she didn’t play the games other women might employ. Leah Bannon was too straightforward for that. She’d pick up just to tell him to give her space, or to go to hell.
So where the hell was she?
…
“I thought you would be here.” Nathan casually strode into his office. In a white button-down shirt and black slacks, he appeared to be the same man who, until minutes ago, had been Leah’s employer and friend. Now, staring at his perfectly groomed dark blond hair and steady green eyes, she didn’t know who she faced. The man who had given her a job when her police career had ended, or the intruder who’d violated her home and tried to kill her. She searched his calm features for some inkling, some clue, and zeroed in on the small cut bisecting his bottom lip. Numbly, she recalled head-butting her attacker. Considering the height difference, she wouldn’t have cracked his nose open, but his mouth… Panic rippled across her soul.
Nathan halted in front of his desk, his arms clasped behind his back. The pose was nonthreatening, but she noted the position strategically blocked the office door.
“Oh, hi, Nathan,” she said, her fingers curling around the gold coin. “I’m sorry for intruding on your privacy. I was looking for the file for my last assignment.” She picked up the manila folder. “To work on the report at home.”
His gaze dipped, and it skimmed over the file folder under her arm and the open drawer before rising to rest on her face once more.
“Why don’t you ask me, Leah?” he asked softly. Reasonably.
She wanted to—God, the words hovered on her tongue ready to leap off and scramble between her lips. But she couldn’t utter the question. Fear of the answer kept the words captive.
“Okay then,” he said, and they could have been speaking about a case, not whether or not he’d tried to kill her, or had murdered three innocent people. “We’ll start at the beginning. Yes, I knew Richard—and more intimately than I allowed you to believe. The coin you have,” he nodded in the direction of her fist, “was Richard’s little ‘graduation gift.’”
His lips twisted into a bitter half smile, the first sign of emotion Nathan displayed.
“After the first time,” Nathan paused, and his slender nostrils flared slightly, “he gave it to me. The lion symbolizes Richard. How’s that for a bit of hubris? And the laurel represents our excellence in becoming one of his ‘special boys.’ Special.” He snorted. “I was special to him until he used me up and tossed me aside like a fucking dirty rag.” Rage seethed and trickled from the fissures in his sophisticated facade.
Moisture fled Leah’s mouth. She tried to swallow, but her throat rebelled, squeezing tight.
“For a year, he romanced my mother and raped me. I hated it, hated myself, but even more I hated losing the person who made my mother smile…and the one person who seemed to give a damn I existed. My father certainly didn’t— he abandoned us and didn’t look back once. Richard may have killed a piece of my soul every time he touched me, but he also made me feel wanted, as if I really was special.”
“I don’t think it’s unusual to have experienced conflicted emotions toward your abuser, Nathan,” she whispered, aching for the hurt, confused boy he’d been. But still not foolish enough to remove her attention from the angry, homicidal man he’d become.
“Conflicted?” His bark of laughter resounded in the room like a crack of thunder. “That sounds much better than deranged. Because when Richard dumped my mother to take up with another woman, I went a little crazy. I felt rejected, disillusioned, and lost, unable to comprehend how he could desert us when he knew my father had done the same. But then I understood why, once I saw Chayot.”
Nathan sneered Chay’s name as if it were a vile curse. More chinks appeared in his composure, revealing the two-decade-old hate and fury Nathan had carefully preserved, tended, and harbored. His lips pulled back from his teeth, and his brows snapped down over his blazing green eyes.
A shiver skated down her spine. This man was treading a fine ledge.
“Richard not only tossed my mother aside, but he dumped me for someone else, too. I stalked Richard—I followed him, needing to find out what this new boy had that I didn’t. I wanted to find out what I could do differently to win him back for my mother and myself. I trailed him to Chay’s home the Friday night he disappeared. I was at the kitchen window when Chay stabbed Richard. I hid in the bushes when Gabriel, Malachim, and Raphael arrived and helped clean up and move the body.”
“You saw it all?” Shock vibrated through her. Jesus.
“Yes,” he said, eyes glinting.
“Why didn’t you say anything? Go to the police?”
“Because Richard had drummed into me that what we did was our secret. No one could ever know—they wouldn’t understand.” A spasm of pain twisted Nathan’s face. “And because…a part of me was glad he’d gotten what he deserved. I loved him, but God, I hated him,” he rasped. “I hated him.”
“You weren’t the first boy he hurt, Nathan,” Leah said, her voice low, soothing, like calming a quivering beast on the verge of leaping on prey or turning and stalking away. “There were many before you. Richard was a pedophile, a serial rapist, and you weren’t responsible for his actions, nor are you responsible for how you felt.”
“No. I am to blame,” Nathan objected. He cocked his head to the side, and his gaze slid to the picture frame on his desk. “It’s all my fault, isn’t it, Mother?” he asked softly. “It was my fault you drank yourself to an early grave. My fault Father left, leaving you alone. And the one time I could’ve been a ‘good boy’ and given Richard what he needed, I ruined that, too. I failed you, failed to hold Richard’s attention, and so he left, too, just like Father.”
Nathan surged forward, slapped his palms down on the desk, and pinned Leah with a stare that gleamed with what she could only call madness. Her breath stuttered, then stalled in her chest. Oh, yes, this man with the glassy, wild eyes could break into her home and attack her.
“But it wasn’t my fault,” he hissed. “It was Chayot Gray’s. He lured Richard from me and my mother and then took him away for good. Do you know the life I led, Leah? Do you? I was a prisoner shackled to an alcoholic mother who resented every breath I inhaled. Even after I moved out of her home, she found ways to punish and humiliate me. I couldn’t have a normal relationship. She ran off every woman I became close to, so all I had was her. She made my life a living hell.”
“Nathan…”
“And all those years I suffered, your four bastard friends went about their lives, never considering the pain and misery they’d inflicted. They moved on, had successful careers, married, one had a family. I had nothing, and they had everything…so I decided to take it from them. Make them suffer like I did. Only after I ripped everything—and everyone—they cared about from their lives would I put them down like dogs.”
“You killed Maura and Ian,” Leah whispered.
“It was easy,” he admitted with a grim smile. “I followed them from their home to the mall and just sliced a hole in the brake line while the car was in the p
arking lot. I was surprised it worked—the idea was spur of the moment. But the outcome was better than I could’ve imagined.”
Nathan’s mission had been accomplished. Gabriel had lost the two people he loved most in the world. His pain should’ve sated Nathan’s thirst for revenge. Yet it hadn’t. The murders had only whetted his appetite for more destruction.
“Why Gabriel first? Why not Chay? He was the one who killed Richard.”
“I want him to suffer the worst. I can’t think of a more fitting punishment than for him to watch, helpless, as the people he loves endure pain, loss, and death. Then—after he loses everyone and everything—I’ll kill him.”
The depth of his hatred stunned her. His evil seemed to permeate her skin, clog her nose and throat.
“I planned my next steps. It required allowing time to pass, so no one would catch on to the connection. And that’s where you came in.” Slowly, he straightened, satisfaction stamped on his face. “You were perfect—a trusted friend to all of them. Seeing the disgust on your face when you uncovered their deception and your inevitable abandonment of their friendship, would have struck another blow. But then your true role soon became apparent. Your death would destroy Gabriel.”
She swallowed a gasp of dismay. “No, you’re wrong.”
Nathan’s eyes narrowed. “On second thought, I might let him live.” He reached behind his back and withdrew a gun. Leah’s stomach plunged to her feet before somersaulting and soaring for her throat. Nathan aimed the barrel at her chest, his hand steady, his green eyes unblinking. “For him, living would be worse than dying.”
She didn’t pause to think. Even as his finger tightened on the trigger to kill her, she snatched up the desk phone and hurled it in at him. The loud bang of the gun firing crashed into her eardrums as she lunged to the side.
Fiery pain lashed at her hip. Her knee buckled. Damn! The hard edge of the desk bit into her skin. No, she silently howled. Not now! A hard, bright gleam glinted in Nathan’s gaze. He believed he had her. She spotted it in his eyes—triumph.
She inhaled, forcibly pushing the throbbing in her hip aside, Slowly, she shifted away from the desk as he leveled his gun on her once more.
I can’t die. Her breath was a harsh wind in her head. I won’t die.
With a growl, she dived forward and plowed into his midsection, a linebacker fighting the game of her life. Satisfaction, fierce and hot, pulsed inside her when the gun clattered to the floor and skidded past her foot. A loud gust of air exploded from him as they tumbled down in a tangle of legs and arms. The impact jarred her arms and knees, and she inhaled sharply. Nathan’s head cracked against the floor, but it didn’t stun him, and her split second’s hesitation handed him the edge in their battle.
With a shout, he bucked his hips, flipped, and pounced. Long, hard fingers gripped her neck and squeezed. Panic shot through her veins. She grabbed his thick wrists, then his fingers, trying in vain to pry them away from her throat. She flailed, kicked, smacked his arms. But he only leaned forward, pressing harder. His face wavered—the grim line of his mouth, the harsh lines of his face, the bright gleam in his narrowed eyes.
No! The primitive scream rebounded in her head. No!
Tapping into a last vestige of strength, she surged up, grasped his head, and dug her thumbs in his eyes. Her stomach roiled with nausea at the spongy give, but she clutched and thrust deeper.
Nathan screamed. He reared back, slapped his palms over his bloody sockets. Gasping past her bruised and burning throat, she hoisted to her hands and feet and scrambled backward. Her spine struck the wall, her head hitting the windowsill. Nathan’s hands dropped from his face with a roar. His eyes, streaming and red, promised pain as terrible as his.
He hurtled forward blindly. She groped her pant leg, dragging the denim up. Her fingertips grazed the butt just as he slammed into her and his hands fumbled, then closed around her neck again.
“Leah!”
Nathan jerked his head up, his attention shifting toward the door. His grasp loosened as he focused on the voice.
She seized advantage of his momentary distraction. Quickly, she unsnapped her backup ankle holster, seized the gun, aimed, and fired. Once. Twice. Three times.
His body jerked with each shot. She stared, unable to tear her eyes from the blood blooming across Nathan’s chest like a pen had exploded in his shirt pocket. He pressed one palm to his breast as if he could plug the holes there, the other covering his shredded eyes. With a final wheeze from his slack lips, he toppled to the floor, and didn’t move again.
The gun trembled in her unsteady grip. Shaking, she lowered the weapon, never removing her eyes from Nathan. Though an ever-widening puddle of blood surrounded his body, she didn’t trust he wouldn’t suddenly rise and attack. In the movies it was always damn hard to kill crazy.
“Leah.” Strong arms closed around her shoulders. The familiar, adored summer-and-sunshine scent enveloped her like a warm embrace. Gabriel. The gun slid from her numb fingers, and she grabbed him.
And held tight.
Chapter Twenty-four
Bone-tired, Leah dropped onto the couch in her living room. The past twenty-four hours had been hell. She’d killed a man, was whisked to the hospital, interrogated at the police station, and finally released. The vivid black-and-purple marks on her neck had done a bang-up job of convincing the cops she’d shot Nathan in self-defense.
She brushed her fingertips over her throat and flinched at the still-tender skin. She hadn’t needed the doctor to tell her she’d been moments away from passing out and death. Hell, she’d been there, and every time she looked in the mirror, there was a reminder like ring around the collar…except no laundry detergent could clean the bruises from her skin. Or scrub the memories from her mind.
At least it was over.
Nathan had been pronounced dead at the scene; he couldn’t hurt Gabriel, Malachim, Chay, Raphael, or those they loved anymore. She lay her head down and studied the ceiling. Now she could go home. Yes, she would probably have some shaky moments—especially whenever she passed the attic hatch—but the threat no longer existed.
She closed her eyes, and for the first time since receiving the letter and missing-person flyer, she was…free. No. That wasn’t exactly true. For the first time in a year—since resigning from the police department—she was free.
Since leaving the force, she’d struggled with anger, bitterness, and the loss of her dream—of herself. She’d felt lost, adrift. But at some point during the investigation, she’d made peace with her new path. Maybe when Detective Connor had offered her his unsolicited validation. Maybe when she’d stared down at all of Richard’s video tapes and realized if she’d still been a cop, the silent voices of those boys would have never been unearthed. Or maybe it had been when she’d faced down Nathan, her hip throbbing but her determination to survive intact.
Once upon a time she would’ve made a damn fine police detective; now she would be a damn fine investigator. With Nathan’s death, the future of his agency was uncertain…and since she’d killed the owner, the probability of continued employment there was somewhere between no-way and not-a-chance-in-hell.
Anyway. Wherever she went from here, it would be okay. She would be okay.
Funny how a near-death experience could put things in perspective.
A knock reverberated at her front door.
Frowning, she rose stiffly from the couch and smothered a moan. God, she needed a spa day. Her body had taken a beating in the last week…pun totally intended. She covered the distance to the door and peeked through the peep hole. Her heart gave a hard thud, then raced, pumping worry and excitement through her veins. Hurriedly, she twisted the lock and opened the door.
Gabriel gazed down at her.
They stood in the entrance, the silence deafening with so many unspoken questions. She drank him in. Against the late Sunday afternoon sunshine, his tousled, brown curls framed a lean face etched with weariness. His full lips formed a
solemn line, and faint smudges darkened the skin beneath his eyes… God, his eyes. She inhaled, and the breath caught in her throat. The arctic blue gleamed, belying the exhaustion creasing his features.
“Can I come in?” he asked.
“Yes, of course,” she murmured, swiftly shifting back a step. He entered, and she shut the door before following him into the living room. He remained standing, studying her with an intense gaze she couldn’t decipher.
“How’re you doing?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Fine, except for the bruises and aches. Those will fade.”
He nodded, fell into another silence. She crossed her arms. The need to close the space separating them and walk into his arms was nearly overwhelming. She wanted his unyielding body pressed to hers, wanted his reassuring touch. But she stayed where she was.
“The attorney Malachim hired received the video tapes you delivered to the police. He believes they will go a long way toward persuading the district attorney to reduce Chay’s charges from murder to manslaughter. And with the extenuating circumstances, he may be sentenced to probation instead of jail time.”
Relief weakened her muscles. “Thank God,” she whispered. “What about you, Mal, and Rafe? Will you be charged?”
He nodded again. “As accessories after the fact. We’re all being tried as minors, including Chay, and so will face the appropriate penalties. Our attorney is confident Mal, Rafe, and I will receive probation. I’m not too sure what that means for Mal’s law license since he was a minor at the time, but,” he shrugged, “he said he’ll cross that bridge when he comes to it.”
The announcement proved too much. The ground shifted beneath her feet, falling away…or maybe it was Gabriel’s strong arms lifting her in the air and holding her against him in a bone-crushing embrace. She clung to him, delighted finally to be where she’d desired ever since opening her front door to stare into his beautiful, loved face.
“You don’t faint after you shoot a man, but you do now?” he teased, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.
