Chapter 4
Cash
“Damn it,” Sage muttered as he scanned the notifications on his phone.
“What?” I asked as I got the car started. Sage and I had just finished up a case and were preparing to make the long drive home.
“We missed a call from Daisy,” he said.
I didn’t comment on the fact that he’d used “we” even though it’d been his phone she’d called.
The only time we’d heard from Daisy in the month since that night at the motel had been when she’d sent us information pertinent to a case. Sage had tried to draw her out via calls and texts in the hopes he could get them back to some form of communication, but she’d resisted his advances.
The whole thing was taking its toll on Sage, which was just more proof that his feelings for the young woman ran deeper than he was willing to admit.
Sage adamantly refused to talk about it, but there was no escaping the guilt he was feeling.
He hadn’t said as much, but it was obvious because his need for me to control more and more of his day-to-day life had continued to grow in the weeks since leaving Seattle and returning to our home just outside the Ozark National Forest in Arkansas.
In the past, it was only on the rarest of occasions that I had to take things to such an intense level outside the bedroom.
Now it was happening on a daily basis. The only time he didn’t need it was when we were working.
I knew the whole thing was my fault. By taking things as far as I had with Daisy, I’d given Sage a glimpse into something he needed but couldn’t have.
Problem was, I was starting to think maybe he wasn’t the only one who needed it.
“She left a message,” Sage said. He looked to me and I immediately nodded.
My heart broke for him that he was so far gone in his own mind that he needed me to tell him it was okay to play a voicemail message.
I suspected most of his behavior stemmed from his fear that I was going to leave him.
No matter how many times I reassured him that I wasn’t going anywhere, he still couldn’t focus on anything but the need to please me.
Sage hit the button and made sure the phone was on speaker.
Um, hi, it’s me. I, um… I just wanted to say… I just wanted to say I’m sorry. I just want… I want things to go back like they were.
There was a good ten seconds of silence before Daisy’s uneven voice continued.
I can’t stop thinking about it.
Her admission sounded pained.
I don’t know what that means, and I want to go back to like it was but maybe that isn’t possible. I miss talking to you, Sage. I miss the way you joke about Cash and him always overhearing you and pretending to yell at you.
I smiled at that. Daisy paused for another long beat.
I guess that’s it. Just… stay safe, okay? What?
The last word was spoken in a way that had me thinking she was talking to someone else while leaving the message. It was confirmed a moment later when she said, Hang on, Dylan, I’m on the phone. Sorry about that, I’ve got someone staying with me.
My eyes met Sage’s and I saw the same thing mirrored in his eyes that I was feeling.
She had a man staying with her.
What the ever-loving hell?
Anyway, I have to go. I just wanted to… I don’t know, hear your voice, I guess. Hear both your voices.
Another long pause.
Stay safe, Sage. Cash too. I’ll… I’ll see you later.
Sage settled the phone in his lap and looked out the window.
I snagged his hair and gently turned him so he was forced to look at me. “Call her back,” I said firmly.
It pained me that he looked both relieved and ashamed by the command.
He did as I said, leaving the phone on speaker. It went to voicemail.
“Fuck,” Sage muttered. “She always answers her phone.”
I settled my hand on his thigh and he instantly linked his fingers with mine. His hold on me was tight. I watched him for a moment, then pulled his hand up to my mouth and kissed his knuckles. I released him so I could put the car in gear.
“Let’s go check on her,” I said. “We’ll take the long way home,” I declared. “Through Columbus.”
“We’re in Chicago, Cash,” Sage said with a smile. “Ohio is like four hundred miles out of the way.”
“Like I said, the long way.” I gave him a wink and got the car moving.
“You don’t have to do that.” Sage’s voice was low and embarrassed.
“Yes, I do,” I said simply. “You’re not the only one who misses her, Sage.”
I felt Sage’s eyes on me, but didn’t look at him. I’d be too tempted to pull the car over again and drag him into my arms – anything to finally make him understand that I wasn’t angry or upset with him.
I’d just have to show him.
Besides, I had ulterior motives. “We’ll just pop in and say hi,” I said calmly. “And introduce ourselves to Dylan.”
I glanced at Sage and saw that he was staring out the window again.
But he was smiling.
He was finally fucking smiling.
Thank God.
“Daisy, honey, can you open up, please?” Sage called through the door. “We know you’re in there. We just want to make sure you’re okay.”
He knocked once more, and waited, but when nothing happened, he threw up his hands. When he looked at me I asked, “Can you use your computer to track her phone?”
Sage nodded.
I wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of invading Daisy’s privacy by tapping into her phone, but after several hours of failing to get a hold of her and now with her not answering her door, my instinct that something was off was kicking up.
Daisy’s role in Ronan’s group was to be available at the drop of a hat.
If she was going to be offline for any length of time, she always let Memphis, the team lead, know so he could have either Mav or Sage act as Daisy’s backup during that time.
We’d called Memphis half an hour ago to ask if he’d heard from her, but he’d said he hadn’t. Since we were so close to her location, he’d agreed that we needed to actually lay eyes on her.
I tapped my fingers on my leg as I considered our options. I was leaning back against the wall outside Daisy’s apartment door while Sage was standing in front of it. It was well after midnight, so none of Daisy’s neighbors were around to ask if they’d seen her.
“Fuck it,” I muttered and reached into my pocket to pull out the tools I’d need to pick the lock on her door.
Sage stepped out of my way, but right as I was about to insert the first tool into the lock, I heard it disengage. I stepped back as the door opened just a crack.
I knew instantly that something was wrong. I felt Sage stiffen next to me as soon as he got a look at Daisy’s face.
What little of it we could see.
The one eye we could see was red-rimmed and swollen and she refused to look directly at us. Her knuckles were bloodless as she held onto the edge of the door. She hadn’t removed the security chain.
“Sorry, I was in the shower,” she said, her voice cracking. “What are you doing here?”
“We were worried about you,” I said as I tried to get a better look into her apartment, but there wasn’t enough of a gap to see much of anything. She was wearing what looked like jeans and a sweater and her hair looked tangled as it fell over her shoulder. It wasn’t even damp.
“I’m fine,” she quickly said. “Um, I’m just… I’m working on some stuff for Roman. You know what a slave driver he is. He’s got me doing two things at once,” she added with a fake laugh.
“Yeah,” I said carefully. “Well, we’ll let you get back to it. Maybe just call us later?” I said as lightly as I could. I saw that Sage was already reaching for his gun.
Good, he’d picked up on Daisy saying Ronan’s name wrong to send us a silent message.
She made a little bit of a choking sound and I desperately wished I could reassure her that I’d heard her loud and clear. “Sure, will do,” she whispered, then shut the door.
The second the lock re-engaged, I turned to Sage. “Two assailants.”
He nodded. I waited one more beat to give Daisy enough time to get clear of the door, then reached for the gun at my back.
I pretended to turn away from it in case someone was looking through the peephole from inside the apartment, then turned in a flash and kicked in the door.
I heard a rough grunt as the wood made contact with a body on the other side.
It took just a split second to determine that the assailant holding onto Daisy’s arm a few feet inside the apartment was too close for me to risk hitting her with my gun, so I launched myself at him.
At the same time, Daisy elbowed him hard in the nose.
My body hit his just as he let her go with a bellow of pain, so Daisy was clear of us when we crashed to the floor.
I heard someone shout behind me, then the sound of flesh striking flesh.
Presumably Sage was going after the guy I’d hit with the door when I’d kicked it in.
The guy beneath me tried to jam his gun into my side, but I managed to grab his wrist. I snapped it like it was nothing and he screamed in agony.
I punched the guy, but before I could knock him out cold, I heard Daisy scream my name.
I managed to look up at her in time to see that she was looking at the door.
I had just seconds to react when I looked over my shoulder and saw a third man standing in the doorway, gun drawn and pointed at me.
I quickly rolled myself and the guy beneath me so he was on top of me.
His body jerked as two bullets hit him in the back.
While the guy who’d pulled the trigger was distracted by the fact he’d shot his own buddy, I shoved the body off me and lurched to my feet.
I launched myself at Daisy as the guy began shooting again.
My body hit hers hard and I did my best to break her fall while still keeping my body on top of hers as we landed on the floor just behind the loveseat.
Several more shots volleyed around us, then everything went silent.
“Cash!” Sage yelled.
“We’re okay,” I said, instantly relieved to hear his voice. I’d lost track of him in the fight.