I hated to wake her up. She had been sleeping so peacefully and the worry lines she'd had the night before were nowhere to be seen. But I craved her like she was an addiction I just couldn't overcome. Her body responded to mine like it was made for me and I couldn't stomach the idea that this was the only time we had together. I wasn't going to let her go.
I couldn't.
"Brannock, everything is ready. I e-mailed you the flight confirmation and made arrangements for the marshals to pick you both up at the airport."
"Good. Thanks, Cap. Now tell me what you found on Dawson."
"Right, by the time I realized I'd forgotten to tell you, I figured you'd be sleeping."
Not much, I thought to myself and grinned.
"Anyway, for the first couple weeks there was nothing. His routine never changed and there was nothing unusual going on. About a week ago, however, he did something totally unexpected."
"And what's that?" I asked impatiently.
"He showed up at Jack's."
My stomach dropped and the blood drained from my face, making me lightheaded. I pressed my hand to the wall to hold me upright. Jack's Pub was one of Lucien Ripley's main headquarters. For months, we had tried to get an undercover on the inside, but his screening was too iron tight and we didn't have a female officer that fit the mold of his employees.
I felt a wave of guilt wash over me. After everything I had thought about her brother, I hoped maybe I was wrong. Was he desperate enough to help her that he'd gone straight to the one man who would kill him on the spot?
Before I could let the hope seep in that her brother actually gave a shit about her, the captain shut it down.
"We got a source that says he's working for Ripley now."
"What?!"
"Calm down, Brannock. It's not a hundred percent certain, but after he walked out of Jack's in one piece, I got approval to have his home tapped. He's only been in and out for short periods of time since he left Jack's. The longest he has spent there is to sleep at night."
"Do you think he made a deal? Something to get his goons off of Emily?"
He sighed and the solemn sound of it told me that was a 'no'.
"A report came in this morning, just thirty minutes ago, Brannock. Dawson was livid when he left his home. The phone call he made was to a cell phone that was pin pointed in Oakland. That same number contacted him just over a week ago. I've got a feeling he's taking this whole thing into his own hands. The only deal he could make with Ripley would be to turn Emily in. You know that."
Shit, he was right. Ripley wouldn't call off the search for her. Period. He wouldn't stop until she was gone, even if he couldn't get to her until after she testified. He had ways of getting his little brother out of prison if he needed to. But Emily, she would be at the top of his list for however long it took.
"Shit."
"Yeah. Shit. You need to get out of there. Your flight is in just under two hours. Get here and we'll figure the rest out."
"Alright. Send me what you've gotten on Dawson. Maybe something will stand out for me."
"Sending it now. See you in a while. Be safe."
I ended the call and turned back to the hotel room door. Emily was going to be crushed. I tried to come up with some chance that her brother was fighting for her, but came up empty. She was smart enough to know that if Ripley didn't kill her brother that day, it meant he still had a use for him and the only use he would have would be to find her. Lucien didn't need anything else at the moment and he wouldn't risk letting Rayce walk away from him unless he could gain something from it.
"Fuck!"
I walked back into the room and heard silence coming from the bathroom. Emily must have taken a quick shower and I was glad for it. We needed to get moving soon.
I found our bags next to each other and opened mine to pull out my jacket, then snagged my badge off the table and snapped it onto my belt before holstering my gun. I'd kept the weapon out of sight most of the time and usually wore an ankle holster unless I was heading to the station. There was no need to hide it now.
I checked my phone and found the e-mails from the captain and scrolled through the report on Dawson. His cell number was there and the number that he had called this morning.
An idea popped into my head that shouldn't have been there. Normally, I wouldn't risk contacting anyone who might be looking for Emily, but there was a better chance of doing it successfully when we were about to leave the state. I had an overwhelming urge to call the kid and find out what the hell was going on. For Emily. I needed to know what his intentions were before I told her that her brother was even more of a dumbass than I originally thought.
I was putting my jacket on when I noticed Emily's purse had been spilled open on the table. I would use her phone since she wouldn't be needing it anymore, that way he couldn't connect me too quickly. Her phone wasn't in the pile on the table, though and I looked over at the nightstand and it wasn't there either. She must have used it to call Margie like she said she was going to and let her know she wouldn't be available to substitute any longer.
We had discussed it shortly after I woke her up this morning. The reminder sent arousal down my spine and I wished we had more time before we needed to leave.
I dug through her duffel bag and my finger snagged on something sharp. I moved her clothes aside and found a shattered cell phone at the bottom, falling out of a hidden zipper. I pulled it out realizing that was what had broken when I tossed her bag aside last night, but it didn't look anything like the phone I had gotten for her.
I blinked at it for a moment, wondering if I was really seeing what I was seeing. She had a phone?
A surge of blood filled my head and I took a deep breath to clear the confusion.
She had a phone that I knew nothing about.
Who the fuck did she call with it?
I tried to piece it back together, but it was destroyed and wouldn't turn on. A million reasons ran through my mind as to why she would hide this from me. Did she not know it was there?
My phone chimed and I unlocked it to find a text from Luke.
Luke: Prints back. Guy who attacked Emily is Trent Marks from Denver. Sound familiar?
Bile began to rise in my throat and the room started to spin. She said the guy had looked familiar, but why the hell would he come after her? The dread rushing through me wouldn't allow my mind to put the pieces together. I couldn't focus.
The bathroom door opened and Emily stepped out with a towel over her head as she dried her hair.
"Hey, what's the plan?" she asked.
I couldn't get any words out and I wanted to turn back the last ten minutes and join her in the shower. Look her in the eyes and feel that same wholeness I had felt when we were making love. Never find out that my hunch about her not telling me everything was actually valid.
God, please let this be some kind of mistake. Please. But my head knew the truth. She'd lied and whatever she had lied about was big.
She pulled the towel away and looked down at me, still crouched over her bag with the mysterious broken phone in one hand and mine in the other.
My question was answered and I wanted to scream when her eyes found it and her whole body went rigid, the blood draining from her face. She gasped and her perfect fucking lips parted. Lips I still wanted to kiss. Lips that had blatantly lied to me.
"Con…"
"What is this?" I asked flatly. My chest tightened with the devastation of her betrayal, but I didn't let it show. I needed to know exactly what she had done and I couldn't let my feelings for her distract me from finding out the truth.
She inhaled a shaky breath before her eyes pleaded with me. Those gorgeous emerald eyes that I had stared into when I told her I loved her. Those eyes that turned my insides to mush when they were paired with her smile.
"I can explain."
"I sure hope so," I snapped.
"Please, I didn't have a choice. He's my brother."
Her brother? This h
ad to do with her brother?
"Who have you been calling, Emily?" I stood and stalked toward her. She backed away from me, her face terrified, and bumped into the wall behind her.
She stuttered and tears formed in those perfect green eyes, twisting my gut in ten different ways.
No.
Just, no.
I glanced into the bathroom and saw the phone I had gotten for her sitting on the counter. Without another thought, I moved toward it and slowly picked it up before making my way back to the bed. She hadn't moved and her body was shaking, tears falling down her cheeks.
I ignored her.
I scrolled through her call history and found a number that hadn't been programmed into the phone. The call was made fifteen minutes ago. While I had been talking to Captain Miller. I opened the e-mail with Rayce's cell number and the two matched.
Another surge of anger made me double over and I dropped my head into my hands.
"Tell me why you've been calling your brother."
"To let him know I was safe."
My head snapped up and I gaped at her. "Are you fucking kidding me? You think he gives a shit?"
"He made me promise. I swear to God, I didn't think it was hurting anyone. He's my brother."
My fists clenched as I stood from the bed and faced her. "When did you call him? Besides this last time."
She ran shaky fingers through her hair and I forced myself to stay in place. My body wanted to surround her and comfort her, but my head wanted to remember her betrayal.
"Um, it was last Saturday. When you went to the station."
"And before that?"
She shook her head. "That was the first time… since I came to you."
My eyes widened and my pulse raced. "Did you call him at your last safe house? With Ross?"
She nodded and more tears fell. She wiped them away and covered her mouth with her hand.
"How long before they found you?"
Her brow furrowed and for a moment, my question confused her. "Um, a f-few days. Why?"
I took a step closer to her, baffled at how ignorant she had actually been. Miller and I had been right. This was all Rayce. "Did it ever occur to you that contacting him could lead them to you?"
"How? He had no idea where I was."
"It's a fucking cell phone, Emily. There are ways to track it."
She was silent for a long moment before she whispered her next words, the tone of it telling me that she was starting to understand. "I knew that. He wouldn't tell them…"
"You honestly believe that?" I narrowed my eyes at her. Images of my family flashed through my mind. She'd put them in danger by being stupid. "You want to know what I was just told? You're brother met with Ripley a week ago."
"What?"
"He walked in there and walked out in one piece. You know what that means?"
Her eyes widened for just a moment before her expression fell and she nodded.
"Now, I have no idea what he has to gain from it, but your brother isn't trying to protect you. Maybe he didn't intentionally reveal where you are, but my best guess is that isn't likely. My only question is why? Why after all the time he spent proving that you mean nothing to him, would he suddenly be concerned for your safety?"
"Conall, please-"
"Tell me!"
She flinched back at my shout and I forced myself to calm down. I would never hurt her, but I was furious and confused as hell.
"Will you please let me tell you everything? Don't walk away until you hear everything."
I folded my arms and nodded stiffly before sitting down on the bed. "Start."
She wrung her hands together and stood a little straighter. Her damp hair fell over her shoulders and soaked into the white t-shirt she was wearing. The strap of her bra was barely visible through the material and I couldn't stop the wave of arousal that shot through me. I hated myself in that moment for letting my body take over.
"He called me at home the night Stanton shot that officer. He was the one that saw it, not me. He begged me to take his place because he was in enough trouble as it was and they would only suspect him instead of Stanton. The hotel was just minutes from my home. When I got there, Rayce was a mess. He said that he had been there with some of his friends hoping to trash a room to piss Lucien off. They had drugs with them and when Rayce saw the cop with Stanton, he got scared and was leaving. He heard the shot and when he ran to see what was going on, Stanton was holding the gun."
"He told you this?"
"Just let me finish," she said with her hand raised to me, her tears had stopped, but the fear was still present.
"Okay."
I didn't want to listen to the rest. I knew without a doubt that Rayce had lied to her. Every piece of evidence conveniently pointed to Stanton. No way Rayce would have been a suspect. He had fed into her need to protect him, her loyalty towards her family, and that pissed me off more than her lie.
"He looked so scared, Conall. I had to trust him, I had to protect him. You have to understand that I would do anything for my little brother, just like you would do anything for your family."
I did understand. It didn't mean I was going to let it go.
"I called the police and you read my statement so you know what I told them."
"And Trent Marks?"
She obviously didn't know the guy like she should have if she'd done what she said she did. It had to be another lie that her brother had set up.
She shrugged stiffly, "Rayce told me what to say and took care of the rest. He said if I didn't do it, he would either go to prison or Ripley would kill him. I only saw the guy for a minute in passing. I was too scared for him to question it any more than I already had. Ripley would be able to get to him easier than he would be able to get to me."
"So you put yourself in his place. Put a target on your head for Lucien to aim at."
"Yes."
"So you're plan was to testify and then what, hope no one found out?"
She sighed and more tears formed when she looked me in the eyes, "That was the plan, until you."
I stared back at her, praying she wouldn't say what I thought she was going to say. My resolve was already slipping with every word that left her mouth. I get it. She had every reason to question her brother, but she didn't. I wouldn't dream of questioning my family if they asked me for help.
I cleared my throat and tightened my fists. "Until me."
"I didn't want to go through with any of this. I knew it was wrong, but I'd already committed and Rayce kept reminding me that if I didn't do it, I would never see him again. I practically raised him, Conall. You know what my parents were like. He's all I got." She took a deep breath and stepped away from the wall. "But when I met you, everything changed. Your family showed me that it takes more than one person to hold it all together. And I fell in love with them."
She stepped closer and my fingers itched to reach out and touch her.
"I fell in love with you."
I wasn't expecting the reaction I had to those words. I was so angry that I didn't think they would affect me. But they did. More than anything had before. It was what I had wanted from her, what I needed from her. But the surge of happiness quickly died and a numbing cold took its place.
"You lied to me."
She stepped closer until she was inches in front of me. "I'm so sorry. When you discovered me packing everything last night, it was because I was leaving to go confess. I realized how much I love you and your family and I couldn't do it anymore. I can't stand the thought of any of them getting hurt because of me. I was going to make everything right, but then…"
Yeah, then I made love to her and told her I loved her and gave her everything. Like a fool. I should have listened to Luke.
"I'm sorry. Please, forgive me. I want to make this right."
Nothing was right anymore and my anger won out. Selfishness won out, just like it did with her.
"You will make it right, but not with me. You're getting on tha
t plane and you're going to tell them everything."
"Conall, I-"
"Don't. I understand the need to protect your family, but you have to understand that I'm protecting mine. You put my sister in danger. My entire family. So I'm going to protect them by getting rid of you."
It was basically a slap in her face and her reaction didn't say any differently. The tightening in my chest made it hard to breathe. I wanted to take the words back, but I couldn't trust her. Not anymore. No matter how much I loved her.
I picked up my phone and dialed Captain Miller. She stood frozen in the same spot until I practically dragged her out of the hotel and into my truck twenty minutes later. Not a word was spoken between us until the call to board the plane. I hadn't told her I wasn't going with her. No way was I giving her a chance to talk me out of it. I still wanted to protect her, but up in the air, she wouldn't need me. Miller knew the situation and was prepared to have someone collect her from the plane themselves.
We stood and she started toward the door where a line had formed. I couldn't decide if I wanted to lift her over my shoulder and carry her away from here or just walk away and never look back.
I went with the harder decision. To watch her walk away and deal with whatever happened next.
"Goodbye, Emily."
She whipped around and stared at me with the same fear I had seen when that fucker had her trapped. It made staying in place almost impossible. I was angry and hurt, pissed at myself for getting attached and not realizing that she was lying from the beginning. I still wanted her, though, lies and all. That's what pissed me off the most.
"Y-you aren't-"
"No. There's no need for me to go with you."
"I…"
"Just go, Emily." I meant to sound harsh, get her to turn around and stomp away, but I couldn't force myself to do it. The words came out so fucking gently. The hurt I was trying so hard to hide was in plain view.
She looked down at her feet and I watched a few tears fall to the ground before she lifted her head once more. "I'm sorry," she sniffed. Then her face slipped back into her mask, bringing her guard up. She nodded and turned away from me to get in line.
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