Chapter 11
Chapter
Eleven
GRACE
Sitting in the back of the van, I kept an eye on O’Rourke where he was bound with his hands behind his back, blindfolded, and sporting a pair of noise canceling headphones.
He hadn’t made a sound since the guys picked me up.
Course, he also had duct tape over his mouth so talking wasn’t really an option even if he was conscious.
The last time I’d seen him had involved fancy outfits, people shooting at us, and him biting me. I was pretty sure explosions had also been involved. It had been a few months, but I couldn’t really decide what his presence here meant.
Particularly because the guys were ignoring him, even if they’d brought him with us.
In the meanwhile, AB sat in the back with me, working on his laptop and Goblin lay between us while Legend drove and Voodoo was on the phone with a contact in the front.
I had a dozen questions, none of which I asked.
Tension wound around the guys like electrified barbed wire. Every shift, every move, every glance drew blood and threatened to send a shock through the system. It was like playing the board game Operation with metal tweezers and we’re bouncing around.
A hand stroked down my arm and pulled my attention from O’Rourke to AB. He frowned as he studied me. “We’ll find him.”
“I know,” I said, not a doubt existed within me. These guys would burn the world down. I had seen them do it. “It’s just…”
“It’s Bones.” Those two words summed everything up. The definition of the man, and oh, how he could irritate. At the same time, at no point when it had been just the two of us had I ever thought I was anything but safe with him.
Even when he was making me crazy, he saved my life.
“I get it,” AB said. “But he’s a tough son of a bitch. He’ll be fine.”
“How did they take him?” Because, every time I’d seen him in a fight or an “action” as they liked to call it, he was like the Terminator. He just didn’t stop. How hurt would he have to have been for them to take him captive?
“Don’t focus on that, Gracie.” There was a request in his voice even if the words were an order. “We’d just be speculating. Speculation has a place, but right now, we need hard facts only.”
I turned those words over in my head, then nodded slowly. “You need hard facts because speculating can go in wild directions and our imagination can run amok.”
“More or less,” Voodoo said over his shoulder and I twisted to find him glancing back at O’Rourke before he focused on me. “They had cleaners with them. Everything is gone. The bar. The location. Everything. Scrubbed like it didn’t exist.”
“How can they do that in a couple of hours?” That was insane.
“They had four,” Legend said and I curled my fingers into my palms, digging my nails in. “It took us time to make sure we had no tails before we headed back to you.”
They probably had to make sure that O’Rourke couldn’t be tracked either. I sighed. “So whatever clues might have been there are gone now?”
“There wouldn’t have been any,” Voodoo told me, his expression gentle. “I wanted confirmation of who or what we’re dealing with.”
“Do you know now?”
“Some,” he said, shifting to look forward. “We’re about an hour out from the new safe house. Can you give us time to secure it and O’Rourke, then we’ll do a full brief?”
He was asking, not telling. They were all worried. “Whatever you need.” Right now, I could do just about anything. A flicker of surprise crossed his face and I caught Legend shooting me a look but I just put a hand on Goblin’s head to pet him and soothe myself.
I could be difficult. I was aware. But I could also be a team player. Right now, that was what they needed me to be.
Ninety minutes later, we were in the new safe house with O’Rourke secure in an actual cell in the basement. I didn’t want to know how they had a house like this set up. Nope. Some things were probably better that I didn’t know.
AB showered while the guys brought his gear in, then I helped him with his thigh while Legend was in the shower. The limp was a lot more noticeable.
“Just cramps,” he said as he stretched the leg out on the sofa.
“Are you overdoing it?” I needed to get baselines on what would be overdoing it for him.
Honestly, he never slowed down. Even when he was hurting, he kept going.
Goblin passed out on the floor next to the sofa.
Perching on the edge, I lifted the laptop off of him and set it aside so I could work my fingers into his thigh.
“Gracie…”
“Five minutes,” I told him. “Set a timer. You hurting yourself won’t help Bones and, based on what I’ve seen, he’d rather you took the time so you could move than potentially leave yourself hampered with both pain and limited mobility.”
As light as I kept my tone, I didn’t ease up on the pressure of the massage. The tension in his thigh, the rigid cording of the muscle and the way his jaw tightened told me he was in pain.
The damp blond of his hair settled in a wave over his forehead despite his attempts with finger combing. We locked gazes and I read all the stubborn in his blue eyes. Hopefully, he read the same in mine. I was not going to let him hurt himself if I could do something to help.
Blowing out a breath, AB reached for me and wrapped his hand around my nape. When he dragged me toward him, he was gentle but I was far from resisting. His lips parted even as our mouths crashed together. The kiss was heat and hunger, yes, and beneath it, something deeper thrummed.
A quiet vow nestled in the press of his mouth against mine, in the way his fingers tightened slightly, not possessive but certain.
It wasn't just want—it was welcome. It was the kind of kiss that said, I see you.
I'm not going anywhere. My pulse stuttered under the weight of it, all heat and tenderness braided with something that felt dangerously close to forever.
He eased up just enough for air, but his hand stayed at my nape, anchoring me there, our foreheads nearly touching.
My breath came fast, shallow, but I couldn’t bring myself to pull away.
Not when his eyes were that close, that open.
He searched my face like he was memorizing something, like maybe he’d found something he hadn’t expected.
Then, soft—so soft it almost undid me—he said, “Thank you for worrying about me.”
I didn’t know what to do with his gratitude, the raw sincerity in it. It landed somewhere deep, unsettled something that I wasn’t ready to name. So I went back to what I’d already given him, what I knew to be true.
“That’s what loving you means,” I whispered, the words barely catching on my breath.
At least to me.
I kissed him again. It was just a brush this time, a promise of my own tucked into the moment.
When I eased back, I concentrated on massaging his thigh once more.
The tension was still there, knotted and tight, and I pressed into it gently like I could take some of the pain from him if I just tried hard enough.
He was quiet, and when I glanced up, his jaw was set like he wrestled with more than just his own discomfort. Maybe words. Maybe the same words I’d just said, but they didn’t come.
“AB,” I murmured, working both thumbs against a particularly stubborn knot. “You don’t have to say anything.”
“You deserve to hear it though,” he argued, his voice tense and rough.
I paused, hands stilling for a beat against the firm line of muscle beneath them. That edge in his voice—it wasn’t resistance. It was strain. Like he was trying to push something past a wall he hadn’t let anyone near before.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said quietly, easing back into the motion, gentler this time. “Whenever it comes—if it comes—it’ll mean more because it’s real. Not because you felt backed into a corner.”
His thigh twitched under my hands, like his body wanted to argue even if his mouth didn’t know how. I looked up, and his eyes were already on me, stormy and uncertain and unbearably soft.
He opened his mouth, closed it, then gave a frustrated shake of his head. “It’s not that I don’t feel it. I just… haven’t said it in a long time. Not like this. Not when it actually matters.”
My chest ached, but I managed a small, steady smile. “Then let it matter. I’m not keeping score.”
His hand found mine, fingers curling tight, like he needed the contact to hold the words steady. He looked at me—really looked—and something shifted behind his eyes, something fragile trying to take shape.
“When this is done,” he said, low and steady, “when we have Bones back, when we’ve found your sister, when we’ve done all of that—” His grip tightened just a fraction. “I want you to have a reason to stay.”
My breath caught, the weight of what he was saying folding over my heart like a blanket—heavy, warm, impossible to ignore.
“You already are,” I said, voice barely more than a whisper. “You’re the reason.” All of them were.
He exhaled hard, like I’d knocked something loose in his chest, and leaned forward to press his forehead to mine again. There were still miles ahead of us—fights to win, wounds to reopen—but in that moment, between the unspoken and the not-yet-said, something real settled between us.
And neither of us pulled away.
A quiet beat passed, thick with everything we weren’t rushing to say and Goblin’s adorable snores. AB brushed over my knuckles, and I could feel the smallest tremble in it, like something in him was finally letting go.
Then, from the stairs as Voodoo descended them, “That’s good to hear.”
He had one brow lifted with his usual easy calm, though the corner of his mouth tugged just slightly upward. “Didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” he said, clearly lying, “but with all this feelings and healing going on, figured I should make sure nobody was dying.”
AB let out a slow breath, and I could feel the warmth of a reluctant smile at my temple.
Voodoo’s gaze flicked to me, and held. “Glad to know we’re all on the same page now.” He let that sentiment linger in the air as he joined us. “But unless you two are planning to kiss your way through a rescue mission, we’ve got a plan to finalize. I’ll grab Lunchbox and food.”
AB groaned under his breath, rubbing a hand down his face. “He’s never going to let us live this down.”
“Nope,” Voodoo called over his shoulder as he walked away. “So hurry up, Romeo.”
AB watched Voodoo disappear down the hall with a quiet sigh, the warmth of the moment still lingering between us like an ember we weren’t ready to stamp out.
He didn’t say anything right away, just leaned back against the cushions with that slow, thoughtful way of his, like maybe the world was just now settling into something he could breathe in again.
I stood, reluctantly breaking the contact, and lifted his laptop from the coffee table and returned it to him. It was closed, but it still hummed faintly.
“You left it open to the satellite map,” I said softly. “Didn’t want to lose your place.”
“Thanks,” he murmured, glancing down at it but not opening it yet. His fingers ghosted over the top, distracted. Still somewhere in the space we’d just carved out.
Before either of us could say more, the floor creaked again, and in came Voodoo and Lunchbox, both carrying plates and mugs like offerings to exhausted gods.
“Sandwiches and caffeine,” Lunchbox declared, setting everything down carefully. “That’s the extent of our emotional intelligence today.”
“Better than nothing,” I said with a grateful smile as the scent of strong coffee hit the air.
Voodoo passed AB a cup, then handed me one with an unreadable look. “Eat. Think. Then we get to work.”
The moment shifted—less tender, more tactical—but no less grounded in what mattered. They were all here. Still fighting. Still pushing forward.
I took a sip of the coffee, bracing myself. Then I looked around at the faces I trusted more than most people would understand, and I asked the only question that mattered now.
“Alright, what do we know?”