Carnival Hill (The Harlequin Crew Book 3)

by Caroline Peckham

  So I hit dial on my phone and pressed it to my ear as it started to ring.

  "How did you know I needed to hear your voice tonight, beautiful?" Rick asked, his voice a little rough around the edges and my heart shattered as I realised his demons had been close and I hadn't been there for him.

  "I hate you being away from me all the time," I said, trying not to let him hear me cry as JJ shot me a curious look. I showed him the caller ID and he sighed, focusing on the road again as Rick replied.

  "Then come stay with me all the time."

  "But then I'd be away from the others," I breathed and a long spell of silence followed.

  "What's happened?" Maverick asked darkly and for a moment I didn't even know where to begin.

  "Chase is gone. Fox kicked him out and we don't know where he went. I have to find him, Rick. I need him..."

  Maverick didn't say anything for so long that I had to double check the call was still connected before a sigh escaped him and he spoke again.

  "I'll head to the towns north of the Cove. It's not like he can run all that fast, is it?" he muttered.

  A choked, hopeless laugh escaped me as relief pooled in my chest. I knew it wasn't like having one more person on the hunt guaranteed anything, but knowing Rick would be searching too, that he even cared enough to help, set something back into place in my heart.

  "I love you," I said before he could hang up and Rick hesitated a moment.

  "I'll find him for you, baby girl,” Maverick swore.

  The line went dead and I dropped my phone in my lap. There was no point calling Fox. He wasn't answering and I seriously doubted he'd be of any help to us right now anyway, though I'd left more than a few pleading voicemails for whenever he decided to check back in.

  All we could do now was search every spot we could think of and hope for the best. I wasn't giving up on Chase though. I'd never give up on him again.

  I’ d been out all night looking for Chase and had only just gotten back to the Isle. I’d wanted to go to Rogue when I’d called her to say I’d found no sign of him and she’d started crying, but she’d been at Harlequin House and it wasn’t like I could just walk through the gates and head into my old home, so I’d left her to be looked after by JJ, feeling useless to her, to myself, to Chase. Not that I gave a shit about Chase, but my girl wanted him back so I’d do what I could to make that happen. Fucking Fox and his fucking arrogance. I tried not to think about the fact I’d been the one to tell Fox about Chase betraying Rogue. Of course, I’d thought the guy deserved anything he got back then. Now…well, fuck, I wouldn’t have placed his ass with Shawn that was for sure. I should have just gotten hold of him myself when I’d heard what he’d done. I could have dealt with it, given him the punishment he deserved. The eye loss was overkill.

  Dammit, I hated fucking Shawn.

  I sat down by the Mariner’s Grave, the old ship wreck half sunk in the shallow waters of Dead Man’s Isle. It was quiet down here, but I guessed this place was always fucking quiet. Especially since Rogue had come tearing back into my life. Now everything seemed emptier when she wasn’t around and I half wondered how I’d lived on this island for so many years without losing my fucking mind.

  Although, when I thought on that a little more it was clear my mind had been lost years ago. And the search parties had gone missing too.

  I pushed up to my feet, growing bored of sitting here with my gaze set on the distant view of the carnival in Sunset Cove. At night, I’d be able to see the lights from here, the way they coloured the hill like a rainbow and made me miss all the fun I’d had whenever it came to town when I was a kid.

  As I walked the beach, my gaze landed on a shape further along the shore and my eyebrows arched with interest as I upped my pace to inspect it. As I drew closer, I realised it was a goddamn body and my intrigue piqued further. The fucker was face down, covered in sand and some seaweed too plus he had a chunk of metal sticking out of his shoulder. I kicked him over with my foot and he slumped onto his back, making my heart bunch up into a tight ball as my gaze landed on the guy’s face.

  Fuck.

  It was Fox motherfucking Harlequin.

  I fell to my knees, my fingers going to his neck as I hunted for a pulse, my gut lurching violently.

  A weak flicker beneath my fingers made me release a hard breath and I took hold of his arm, hauling him up with a grunt of effort and throwing him over my shoulder.

  I walked as fast as I could up to the hotel and tried to work out how he’d ended up here and why the fuck I was hurrying inside with him like I gave a shit what happened to him. But maybe I did, because Fox Harlequin didn’t die washed up on a beach, that was too damn easy for him, especially after he’d upset my little unicorn.

  I barked orders at my men to bring me everything the asshole would need to survive whatever the fuck had happened to him, then I carried him to the spa where I’d kept Rogue prisoner. My muscles burned with effort as I finally made it there and walked straight into the sauna, laying him down on one of the benches and starting to strip off his shoes, jeans and shirt so he was just in his boxers. I slipped his phone from his pocket, dropping it into mine instead for…safe keeping.

  “You don’t get to die washing up on my beach like a fucking half eaten dolphin, asshole,” I gritted out through my teeth. “You need to wake up so I can kill you myself.”

  A couple of my men appeared including Nick who’d been a medic in the army and had been useful to me on more than one occasion. I stood strategically in front of Fox’s face to hide him from view but as Nick hurried forward with a medical bag in his hand, I stepped back to let him examine the huge piece of metal in Fox’s shoulder and quickly sent the rest of my men away.

  “Holy shit, that’s Fox Harlequin,” Nick gasped.

  “No shit, Sherlock. Now save his ass or I’ll kill you.” I drew my revolver, pointing it at Nick’s head and his eyes widened in surprise before he set to work removing the lump of metal from my brother’s flesh.

  “Jesus, a couple of inches to the right and it could have severed his carotid,” Nick muttered.

  “That bad?”

  “Yeah, certain death bad,” he said. “Lucky he didn’t pull this out himself either.”

  “He ain’t stupid,” I murmured and Nick gave me the fucking side eye like he was wondering why I was so desperate to get Foxy boy fixed up. “Just hurry the fuck up.”

  Nick cleaned the wound then stitched it up before binding it in a bandage that looped under Fox’s arm.

  “He’ll need the bandage changing daily and I’ll have to keep an eye on it for infection, but he’ll live,” Nick said.

  I nodded stiffly, my shoulders drooping as I holstered my gun. “Why’s he not waking up?”

  “I’m not sure…what happened to him?” he asked.

  “Fuck knows. He washed up on the beach,” I said.

  “Right, well then I’d guess he’s exhausted, he must have been in the water a while.” Nick checked his pulse and I leaned closer to look at Fox’s face. He had more colour in his cheeks now and it did something to ease the knot in my chest. Not that I gave a fuck.

  “This isn’t the best place for him. He needs dry clothes, a warm bed and ideally some fluids. I don’t have anything here for a drip, but if he warms up he might wake then he can drink something.”

  I nodded, scooping Fox up again with a grunt of effort and Nick trailed after me as I carried him to my bedroom and placed him on the bed. I felt Nick’s eyes on me as I pulled clothes onto my arch nemesis, layering him up with two sweaters, some sweatpants, a beanie hat and three pairs of socks before tucking him under my comforter as well.

  Then I stood at the end of the bed, folded my arms and waited.

  “It might take him a little bit of time to-” Nick started.

  “I get it. I’ll be here when he wakes up. Fetch some water if you wanna be useful.”

  He nodded, scurrying away and I remained standing there as I stared at Fox, his expre
ssion completely peaceful like he had no fucking idea what was going on. He wouldn’t like it when we woke up and that gave me a little more reason to want to see his eyes open. The only reason, some might say. Because torturing Fox was what I enjoyed best. So why won’t he wake the fuck up dammit?

  Nick returned with a couple of glasses of water, placing them down on the nightstand and moving to grab a chair like he was going to stay here too.

  “Out,” I barked, pointing to the door.

  “Oh, right, sure.” He backed away, slipping out of my suite and leaving us in silence.

  My jaw ticked as I stood there, my gaze riveted to Fox’s face.

  It was another twenty minutes before he finally stirred, his eyes flickering open as a groan passed his lips and confusion crossed his features as he slowly regained consciousness.

  “Hello, Foxy,” I purred, moving toward him and handing him a glass of water.

  “Maverick?” he frowned then cursed as he sat up and jarred his shoulder, wincing from the pain. “Fuck, what’s going on?”

  “Drink,” I commanded, placing the water in his hands and he chugged it down, clearly desperate for the liquid, so I passed him my one too. Because I didn’t want a drink anyway, the tap water on the Isle tasted like an old racoon’s asshole.

  Fox gulped that down too then placed the glass on the nightstand and rubbed a hand over his head like it was hurting.

  “I always told you you couldn’t make the swim from shore to Dead Man’s Isle,” I said with a taunting smirk. “Were you coming out here for some covert attack bullshit? Because I have to say, Foxy, you get a D minus for effort.”

  “Fuck off,” he snarled, pushing the comforter away and getting to his feet, though he swayed a little as he did so. “I need a boat.”

  I roared a laugh, stepping forward to get right in his way as I came nose to nose with him. “You’re not the king of this island, Foxy boy. In fact, you just wandered right into my domain. So I think you’re gonna tell me what brings you here or I’ll start cutting off fingers. Was it the shame of sending Chase away and breaking Rogue’s heart that made you try to drown yourself?”

  He gazed at me with an emptiness in his eyes that made me frown, like he didn’t care if I carved him up and baked him into a pie, and that was no fun. “I went out on a job solo, blew up a boat and accidently took my own boat out with it.” He shrugged his good shoulder, trying to get past me again but I slammed a hand to his chest as I got close to his face, looking right into his eyes.

  “You look sad, Foxy boy, what’s going on?” I growled curiously, my mind skipping to my girl.

  He wet his lips. “I caught JJ fucking Rogue,” he deadpanned. “Happy?”

  My brows arched as I absorbed this news that Rogue had forgotten to tell me, then another laugh fell from my lungs as I clapped him on the shoulder. “Oh how very unfortunate, brother.” I smiled from ear to ear. “How fucking heart breaking for you. I did tell them it would all end in tears, but would they listen?”

  “You knew?” he gritted out and I smirked like an asshole.

  “Of course I knew. I know all the dirty little Harlequin secrets. I’m a fountain of knowledge, me.”

  “You piece of shit.” He shoved his palms against my chest and I laughed harder as he went feral on me, nearly knocking me to the floor, but he was clearly tired as fuck.

  I whistled for my men and a bunch of them appeared as I pushed Fox back and directed them to tie his arms behind him. He put up a damn good fight considering he was battling exhaustion and a fucked up shoulder, but he was in no position to win so they soon had him trussed up nicely for me.

  “Take him to one of the empty hotel rooms,” I said with a triumphant smile. “You’re officially my prisoner, Foxy boy, and as there’s no Harlequins knocking down my door to save their king, I have to believe no one knows you’re here. So I wonder what Daddy’s gonna think when you don’t come home.”

  I felt numb.

  I knew it was just me going back to my same old coping mechanisms, but it was what it was. Nothing touched me. The pain of what I'd lost couldn't hurt me. I was just here.

  We hadn't found Chase. We'd searched every place we could think of, we'd headed out of town, we'd called around hospitals, hotels, freaking gas stations asking if anyone had seen a dude with an eyepatch but no. Nothing. Chase was a ghost lost to the wind and I was just...empty.

  Fox hadn't come back either. It had been ten days and he'd been just as absent as Chase, only texting a few times to say he was fine and that he needed some time alone.

  Alone.

  Fuck him.

  Being alone was the one thing in this world that I knew I didn't want because I knew the taste of it all too well. Chase had feared that too. He'd grown up in a house where he was a one man army trying to fight against the full force of the monster who had fathered him. He'd been alone his whole life growing up in that hell.

  Me and him were the only ones who had ever really understood that. What was out there away from the safety and love of our little family. How lucky we'd been to have each other.

  And now Fox had taken that from him in my name, like using me as an excuse made it somehow okay despite my feelings on the subject. What had he even thought would happen? That me and JJ would just accept his decision in this? That he could pick and choose who got to be in our family and what they were allowed to do within it.

  Then he'd just run off at the first evidence of his control slipping. I'd made it clear to him that I wasn't going to be his girl exclusively. My whole life I'd been telling all of them I'd never pick between them. But the way he'd looked at me when he'd found me in JJ's arms had been filled with this devastated kind of betrayal like I'd broken a thousand promises to him when all I'd done was love one of my boys in a way he didn't want me to.

  But he didn't get to choose that for me. And he didn't get to choose Chase's fate either.

  Only he had. And we couldn't find him to tell him we wanted him back. I was angry at Chase for that too. Looking back on that morning it was clear to me now that he'd known what was coming. He'd hugged me a little too tight, watched us a little too closely and the brush of his lips against mine now left a taste of goodbye on my skin which would never wash off. So I was pissed at him because he should have said something. We would have stopped this from happening. Or if we couldn't, then we would have gone with him.

  But no. He'd chosen for us just like Fox had chosen for us and now I had no choice but to just give up.

  "Where is he?!" Luther bellowed and I flinched as I looked around from my spot at the breakfast bar with my uneaten dinner laid out before me.

  Luther strode straight into the room, clearly having let himself into the house and JJ got to his feet beside me, positioning himself between me and the leader of this gang of assholes.

  "I told you, we don't know," JJ said, raising his hands placatingly, but I could tell that Luther had finally lost his patience and he was done waiting for Fox to come home.

  "You must know something!" Luther bellowed. "My son wouldn't just walk out on his responsibilities here even if he did fuck up that job. He won't answer my fucking calls and he just sent me this."

  Luther brandished his phone at us and my eyebrows arched as I read the message from Fox.

  Fox:

  Maybe you should go find a nice girl to bury your dick in and relieve some of that tension you're holding onto, old man. I told you I need a few days off and it seems to me that if you got laid a bit more often you wouldn't be such an unbearable cunt all the time.

  "Jesus," JJ muttered while I fought the urge to laugh. Or cry. Who even fucking knew anymore?

  "This is on you," Luther snapped, sidestepping JJ to get a clearer look at me as he pointed in my face and my heart catapulted up into my throat. But as he went on it became clear that he still didn't know the reason for Fox going AWOL and I relaxed a little. "I gave you a job to do, yet now one of my sons has gone on a fucking vacation and I still don't see a
ny sign of the other."

  "Rick's coming around," I said placatingly, though I wasn't sure how much truth there was to that declaration. "And I'm sure Fox will be back soon."

  "I see no evidence of any of that being true," Luther snarled and JJ tried to tug me behind him again.

  "It is," I said forcefully. "We're actually heading over to see Maverick tonight. He wants to spend time with me and JJ and the last time we were there he didn't seem against the idea of reconnecting with Fox too. I think now that he understands that the things that happened in prison weren't on any of you, he's starting to look at things differently."

  Luther released a harsh breath, some of the tension relaxing from his shoulders as he dropped his hand and backed up a little.

  "Good. That's good. You deal with that tonight then and I'll work on finding my other fucking son. If he doesn't get back here soon I'm going to have to make an example of him though. There's only so long that I can lie to cover his absence." Luther strode over to the fridge, muttering something about ungrateful boys being the end of him and I realised he fully intended to stay here for a while.

  I exchanged a look with JJ and he nodded to my silent suggestion.

  "We're gonna get going then. It'll be getting dark soon and Rick will be wondering where we are," I said and Luther grunted his agreement.

  I poked JJ to get him moving and we hurried upstairs where I quickly packed a bag with some clothes and my toothbrush while JJ followed suit.

  "So that's the job Luther gave you?" he asked in a low whisper. "To reunite Fox and Rick?"

  "Simple, huh?" I said, giving him a knowing look and he groaned.

  "More like impossible. Why the fuck would you agree to that?"

  "Well there was a gun pointed at me which was pretty motivating," I said. "Besides, I figured if they'd rather let Luther kill me than reunite, I could just run the fuck away."

  JJ muttered curses about me being the most insane woman he'd ever met as we headed back downstairs and we said a quick goodbye to Luther.