Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
FORD
My phone signaled an incoming text. Hawk.
Stay down. Active shooter.
That was it. As it should be. Hawk was doing what Hawk did best—keeping us safe. But it hammered home how much danger we were all in. How much danger I was putting everyone in.
“What did he say?” Paige asked in a whisper.
“To stay down.”
Cold air filled the room, this time from the broken window.
Paige’s blood, warm and wet, smeared my arm.
The feel of it had my stomach rolling, and I fought the urge to vomit.
Not the time or place, I ordered myself.
I couldn’t help it. Bad enough that Paige was injured and bleeding because of me. Now we were stuck here, waiting.
I turned on the flashlight on my phone and scanned it over her body again.
Her back had been facing the window when it shattered.
The glass had exploded like a thousand tiny projectiles.
I couldn’t put together the sequence of events.
At the time, I’d been focused on Paige, kissing her and then tossing her on the bed.
We’d been moving when the bullet smashed through the window.
Exactly the wrong place at the wrong time.
As far as I could tell, all the cuts were on Paige, and the blood on me was hers.
Echoing my thoughts, she asked, “Are you bleeding? Did you get cut?” She grabbed my phone, turning the light so she could shine it on my face, my arms, twisting as much as she could to get it on my legs.
“I’m fine,” I said. “I don’t know how, but I’m fine.”
“You have a scratch here,” she reached up and touched the side of my neck.
If I’d been cut, I didn’t feel it. “Your back was to the window when the bullet came through,” I said. “The glass got you.” I caught her hand in mine. “Hold still. Moving is just going to make it bleed more.”
She craned her neck to see what she could of her cuts. “They don’t feel deep.”
I couldn’t hear her. Not the way I needed to. All I could see was the blood. Smearing across her cheek. Staining her arms, her lower leg.
“Don’t move,” I warned. “There’s glass all over the floor, even under here.”
She went still, murmuring, “I’m okay.”
A spurt of fear-filled rage shot through me. Not at her, but at the situation. At my own dumb fucking choices. My life decisions that led us all here.
“It’s not fucking okay, Paige. We’re hiding under a bed because someone shot at me.
You could have been…” I choked the words out, feeling every one like a stab to my heart.
They could have hit her. I could be holding her dead body right now.
It was a matter of inches, of luck and timing.
We’d been lucky. Next time, we might not be.
And what would we do if our luck ran out?
I wasn’t crazy about the idea of dying. If I got a say, I’d prefer to stick around for another five decades at least. But Paige?
Nothing was going to happen to her. I couldn’t stand the idea of it.
Twice—in the parking lot and now in my own bedroom—she could have been killed, just for being near me.
No. It was too high a price to pay. I couldn’t allow it.
“We can’t do this anymore,” I said, my heart cracking in half as I put the thought into words.
“What do you mean?” Paige asked, her brow furrowed as she squinted at me in the dim light beneath the bed.
“I mean, we can’t be together. You need to stay away from me. You should leave Heartstone. Go to a safe house or…shit, I don’t know if Cole knows about you. You might be safe to just leave, but a safe house would be better.”
“Ford, stop.” Her hand came up to touch my cheek. “This is bad, okay? I agree this is not a good situation, but I’m not leaving you. I’m not running away.”
“You have to,” I said. How could she not get it? Her life was at stake.
“Ford, you’re not thinking about this clearly,” she said, her tone even, at direct odds with the scampering fear I could barely contain. “We’re all in danger, and it’s not because of you. It’s because Cole Haywood is a murderer and a psychopath.”
“If I wasn’t here, this wouldn’t be happening,” I argued, knowing I was right.
Whether it was my fault was a different argument.
I was sure Paige would take the other side.
But I knew. I’d made choices. Those choices had hurt people.
One of those hurt people wanted me to pay for it.
I didn’t think the punishment fit the crime, but I wasn’t exactly in a position to parse guilt and innocence.
Paige didn’t deserve to pay for my crimes.
“I can’t stand the idea of anything happening to you. ” I felt her soften.
“I can’t stand the idea of anything happening to you either,” she said. “But I’m not going to leave you. I’m not a quitter.”
Why wasn’t she getting it? She was making this harder by dragging it out.
“Well, maybe I am,” I said. “Maybe this is too much. Maybe you don’t know what’s best for you.”
“I’m not a child,” she snapped. “I’m an adult and I can make my own choices.”
“But you don’t get to make them for me,” I said, keeping my tone reasonable. I had to get her to understand.
Paige lapsed into an irritated silence. I was being an ass—I knew it—but I couldn’t back down. Her life was at stake.
That was all I could think of. Her life.
This wasn’t about her being mad or thinking I was a jerk.
This was about her heart continuing to beat, her lungs drawing breath, because some assassin’s bullet hadn’t taken her life.
I’d been selfish this whole time. I understood that now.
Crystal clear. I saw her and I’d wanted her.
God, I wanted her so badly. The light that glowed inside her, the way she laughed, how good she was with people, with the kids, my family, me.
And it’d only gotten worse when I actually spent time with her and discovered we could talk all night and never run out of things to say.
I had to make her understand.
“Paige,” I said, not knowing how to explain. “I spent my entire life surrounded by selfish people, and I’ve been selfish too often. I love you.” I hadn’t thought to say the words, but when they came out, I knew they were true. “I’ve never been in love before,” I added.
She stayed silent for one breath. Two. I found I wasn’t scared of her not loving me back, of her not saying the words. I just needed her to know what was in my heart.
“How do you know you are now?” she asked, her voice quiet.
I didn’t need to think. I just said what was real. What I knew.
“Because for the first time, I’m not the most important person in my world. I can’t stand the idea of anything—or anyone—hurting you. And being near me is getting you hurt. I love you too much to let myself be selfish with you.”
“And I don’t get a say in any of this?” Her breath hitched.
She forced out the words, “I don’t think you can love me, because if you did, you’d listen to what I want instead of telling me how it’s going to be.
You’re telling me what you can live with, but I can’t live with walking away from you.
I’m not going to abandon you just because things are hard.
That’s not who I am, and it’s not fair for you to ask me to walk away.
If you don’t want to be with me, if this has run its course, then—” The words caught in her throat.
“Paige,” I said, hating the pain in her voice. I reached to touch her face, but she batted my hand away, slamming her arm into the underside of the bed. Her gasp of pain sliced through me. “Be careful—”
The door to the room opened, and the light flicked off.
“It’s me,” Hawk said. “Ryder and Wren are out pinning down the sniper. I’m turning the lights out in here to cut the view. I’m going to cover this window. You two okay under there?”
“Paige is bleeding,” I said.
“How badly? Stitches?” he asked, moving across the room.
“No,” Paige answered before I could. “It’s mostly stopped, I think. I’m pretty sure I don’t need any stitches.”
“I’m not surprised,” Hawk said. “There’s glass everywhere.”
We fell silent, the only sounds in the room the rustling of Hawk hammering something to block the window. It felt like an eternity before he said, “Done. Give me one second to get this glass out of the way, and then you can slide out from under there. We’ll go downstairs for a debrief.”
Feet thumped across the floor and out into the hall. I heard the door of the utility closet open and shut, and then Hawk was back. A crystalline rattle of glass shards, the whoosh of the broom on the floor, and finally, he said, “All right, you’re clear.”
Hawk flipped the lights back on. When he saw Paige, he swore under his breath. I couldn’t say anything, my mouth dry, lungs frozen. She was streaked with blood—smeared across her neck and down her arms. A long scratch on her arm still bled sluggishly, along with another on her calf.
“Let’s get you bandaged up,” Hawk said. He grabbed the robe that hung on the back of my door and handed it to me, not seemingly aware that Paige was half naked, except to offer the robe so she could cover up. She was too shaken, I think, to be embarrassed.
I reached for her arm after she had the robe on, and she jerked it away, refusing to look at me. I accepted it, even as her anger sliced through me. Couldn’t she see that this was the only way? Being near me put a target on her back, whether she was an actual target or not.
Cole Haywood and whoever was trying to claim his bounty didn’t give a shit about collateral damage. They’d hurt her if she was in the way—and if she was near me, she’d be in the way.