Chapter 36
THIRTY-SIX
T he buzzing of his phone woke them as gray morning light filtered through the windows.
As soon as Blaine saw the number, his stomach clenched tight.
He sat up.
“Everything okay?” Xanthe murmured sleepily.
“Yeah. Go back to sleep,” he whispered, running his fingers through her hair.
He left the room to return the call in his office with the door shut. For privacy and so as not to disturb Xanthe.
“How bad?” he finally asked after the man explained what had happened.
“Scale of one to ten based on the worst we’ve seen? Nine. We’re trying to stabilize her before it escalates.”
Fuck. He rubbed his forehead. “Okay. I’ll be in as soon as I can, but it’ll be at least a couple hours before I can get over.” He’d have his pilot fly him there and back. He wanted to deal with this as fast as possible and get back to Xanthe. She needed him too. And he needed her.
She was curled up on her side watching him when he returned to his bedroom, hands tucked under her cheek. “Is it Maddy?”
“No.” He had never felt so torn, circumstances beyond his control pulling him in two opposite directions. But he couldn’t be in two places at once, and this current crisis needed his immediate attention.
He leaned over to kiss her, filled with dread and weary to his soul at the thought of what he was about to face.
“I have to take care of a few things on the mainland. Stay here and make yourself comfortable in the meantime. I’ll be back as soon as I can to help you with your insurance company, then take you down to your place to get all your things.
” Everything that could be salvaged, anyway.
She searched his eyes. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” She wanted casual. This situation was the polar opposite of that.
As he withdrew, she grabbed his arm. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
He forced a smile to put her at ease, aching inside.
Last night he’d broken through her walls, had soaked up every minute of her trust and that closeness.
In the cold light of day, everything that had happened yesterday would be hitting her hard.
He wouldn’t leave her now if he’d had any other choice. “Everything’s fine.”
It wasn’t. But he had to believe it would be at some point. Somehow.
“Go back to sleep. You need more rest,” he murmured, hating to leave her. Fearing what he was going to walk into once he arrived in Seattle.
She stared at him a long moment. “You’ll call me if you need me, right?”
His chest squeezed. She was being targeted by a crazy person, had just lost her home on the heels of a string of tragedies that had wounded her deeply. She’d told him she wasn’t ready for anything serious between them. Yet she was worried about him.
Other than Maddy and his mom, when was the last time anyone had cared about him that way?
“Yes,” he lied.
There was no way he would add to her burden right now, and he still wasn’t ready to tell her about his private life. Things were so new between them. He didn’t know where they went from here, or how she would react if he told her everything.
It was a huge reason why he’d stayed single for so long. The last time he’d let someone in and told her his secrets, she’d walked out after the first inevitable crisis and never come back.
The house was still and quiet as he locked the front door behind him. A lead weight sat in the middle of his chest as he walked out into a cold, steady rain, his thoughts torn between the woman he was going to and the once-in-a-lifetime woman curled up in his bed.
His feelings for Xanthe didn’t change anything. The morning’s emergency phone call was yet another pointed reminder that his first responsibility would always be to another woman.
The gates at the end of the mansion’s driveway opened, and Slater’s Audi pulled out. Don kept his gaze averted as he drove up the street in the opposite direction.
Slater was alone.
Don glanced up at the exclusive mansion as he passed it, aware of the imaginary digital clock ticking down in his head. Aware that every hour slipping by without a resolution to the issue put him at greater risk.
Powerful people behind the scenes were running out of patience. With him. With this whole situation.
Slater’s change of heart about the project made him a threat. If Don didn’t deliver the money he owed by the deadline, that was bad enough. But if he didn’t get rid of the woman turning Slater’s head?
They wouldn’t just kill him. They would carve him up. Maybe even go after his family members just to prove a point and show him the evidence before they killed him too.
And things were even worse now, with Lazos and her research team digging around, looking for answers. Poking their noses in places that could jeopardize an expensive, sophisticated operation that had taken years to set up.
The message he’d received last night had been clear. Either he killed Lazos, or they killed him.
It was one of the easiest decisions he’d ever had to make.
He checked the rearview mirror. Slater hadn’t noticed him. Kept driving to the end of the street, then turned left at the corner and disappeared from view behind the trees.
Don stopped and wheeled his car around, heading back to the mansion gates. They closed just as he got there. He stayed near the end of the driveway, aware that he was probably on camera somewhere.
He wiped the sweat from his upper lip, thinking hard. He’d followed them after the fire, and she hadn’t come out.
She was in the mansion. Alone.
Breaking in and taking her by force wasn’t an option. Slater would have top-of-the-line security and cameras all over the place.
Don didn’t intend to get caught. He needed to find a way to get rid of her and then make it the hell off this fucking island so he could head to a non-extradition country and lay low for a while.
As soon as he got enough together to pay off his debts, it should be safe enough to figure out the rest of his life.
He continued down the street, turned the opposite way Slater had, and parked in a little pullout down the road to wait. Lazos was alone for now. If he got lucky, she might come out at some point before Slater got back.
If she did, he would have to act fast.