Chapter 48
Dixie
We sped into the dark. Ahead of us, Heretic roared on his bike, flying past Convict.
Tyler clutched my hand in his.
My heart wouldn’t stop pounding.
“Call Arran.” He handed over his phone.
I hadn’t forgotten his passcode, so the call rang through the speakers in seconds. Tyler spoke in clean, clipped sentences, explaining what had happened. His rescue and our return. Poor injured Ash.
Arran listened without interruption. “Fucking Christ. We’re on our way back, but we were heading to Glasgow. Get to the warehouse and lock down. You’ll beat us there.”
“Understood.”
Arran hung up.
Next, Tyler had me call Convict.
“Ash woke up. Mila is calming him. Leave him with us, and I’ll report back when he’s been seen.”
Tyler agreed and the call disconnected.
He squeezed my fingers, tension in the way he held himself. “His leg looked messed up.”
“The doctors will fix him. Pretty sure from your scars, you’ve seen worse.”
He breathed out. “Maybe. Why the fuck are Arran and the others on their way back from Glasgow? Actually, forget that. Tell me everything that’s happened since last night. Don’t miss a thing.”
From the mansion, we’d taken country lanes then merged back onto a main road, safety in the flow of evening traffic. I knew from his checking the rearview that he was looking for a tail. I guessed we were in the clear, as Tyler kept to the speed limit. Safe and steady.
Emotion rushed in me. “I just…need a second. I was so worried about you.”
I inched to the edge of my seat and hugged his arm. I needed that warmth. The feel of him safe and unhurt. Tyler curled an arm around me.
With my forehead to his shoulder, I shook.
“I was so scared for you,” I tried again. “You were missing, and I didn’t realise it. I thought you’d left me. You said you’d find a way to do that. I’m so sorry I wasn’t quicker—”
Tyler released a breath. “You have no idea how badly I want to stop this car right now.”
I clutched him tighter. Always, he delivered a sense of safety. I wanted to give that right back.
“I never wanted to leave ye. I said those words to give ye the choice because of how we started. I’m sorry I said it.”
“Forgiven.”
Tyler nudged me. “Ye told me something last night.”
I had. “Want a repeat?”
His voice came out rough. “Not yet. Let me get us to safety first.”
We blazed on into the night, out of the dark countryside and to the suburbs of Deadwater, the glow of light pollution welcoming us in.
The pink neon of the warehouse allowed me a deep breath for the first time since leaving my grandparents’ place.
The clubs had been closed early, and a number of crew vehicles waited around the building. A guard, protecting us. Tyler drove straight in, parked up, then rounded for my door. He lifted me from my seat and carried me into the building.
Inside, safe and secure, he ignored every face to bundle me into a side room. “Say it. Now.”
“That I love you? It’s true.”
“Say it again.”
“I love you.”
He groaned some kind of urgent sound. “I’m so in love with ye I can hardly say.”
I laughed, happiness flowing where pain had been. “Try.”
Tyler took my hand and kissed it, holding my gaze hostage with his.
“You’re so fucking brave. I love that about ye.
But that wasn’t why I fell. It was love at first sight.
Obsession, I called it, but I didn’t know the difference.
Ye were mine from the second I gave myself rules to manage the emotions. ”
“I broke your last rule.”
“Don’t say ye regret it. I’m glad it happened.”
Our kiss took me down hard. It turned desperate fast. His fingers speared into my hair, the taste of him taking me over.
We grasped hold of the other. I had a lot to tell him but didn’t want to interrupt the moment. The world could wait.
But Tyler tore away to hold me. Full body mapping, his to mine. No space between us, nothing to disguise how much he needed me.
It was a promise for more. Of what we didn’t have time for now but needed hours to work over later.
“Never let me go again,” I asked.
“I swear I won’t.”
“Your tracker failed. We almost didn’t find you.”
“I’ll let Shade know. We’ll fix it.” He brushed my hair back. Gazed at me. “What else do ye need to tell me?”
I swallowed. “A few things. My identity got blown. I’m all over the press.”
Tyler flinched. “Is that my fault? The cameras were on us upstairs. I lost control. If I said something…”
“You didn’t. The video we made was just for us. It wasn’t streaming. My mother is the guilty party.”
He stilled. Accepted the newest example of my terrible family background. “I’ll help ye handle her.”
“To be honest, I’ve barely thought about it. That’s a next-week problem.” I centred myself for the next part. “There’s a reason the skeleton crew were heading to Glasgow. When we realised you’d gone, your uncle told us you would be going after a prisoner. The one you told me about.”
“Ye met Jonas?”
“He…had a lot to say.”
Pain crossed Tyler’s expression. “Did he now? He never did have any discretion. I’m guessing he told ye about my past?”
I felt every bit of that ache. It cut me up worse than anything in my past had. “I hate that that happened to you.”
He heaved a sigh, his big chest inflating. “I wish I’d had the chance to tell ye myself. No moment felt like the right one.”
“Because of everything I was going through. I know.” In the short time I’d had to think about it, I realised that Tyler would protect me from everything, including himself. He wouldn’t want to take the focus off me, even for a minute. But that wasn’t healthy or fair.
“If this,” I pointed between our chests, “is going to work, you have to treat me like an equal partner. Not someone precious and breakable.”
He nodded once. “I’ll give ye it all. The whole sordid story. But…”
“Not now. I know. When you’re ready.”
I hugged him. We stayed like that for another minute. Just existing in a pocket of safety.
Finally, Tyler drew back. “I need to go to Ash.”
“And I need to find my sister and talk to the skeleton girls.” They would have a field day with tonight’s revelations. I wondered if anyone had seen the clues.
He kissed my forehead. “Don’t leave the warehouse.”
“I’ll stay in our apartment.”
“Ours. Christ, woman. I’ll never get over hearing that.”
Tyler escorted me upstairs, and I called in the members of the skeleton girls detective agency. With Mila adding thoughts over the phone from the hospital, I related all that had happened. The murders. The appearance of Denise and Presley. Her death.
Working through the facts cemented it as real. I settled on the sofa and let the adrenaline ebb away.
Cassie goggled at Primrose’s stabby reasoning. “That’s what I was searching for in all the clues. The connection between the three people they killed. If I’d spotted their links to the three of you siblings, I might have guessed.”
Lovelyn wore a matching expression of shock. “I considered Wallace briefly, but not after I met him. I didn’t think he had it in him.”
I raised a shoulder. “On his own, I don’t think he does. But with his mother ordering him, and probably motivating him with money, he turned into a killer.”
Cassie shook her head. “And Presley killed Paul Debrock. Little shit. But he was also the one who hurt ye. I wish Tyler had let Heretic kill him.”
I sighed. “I want to see him jailed so the police don’t pin that on anyone else.”
Curled up on the end of the sofa with a hand to her baby bump, Everly spoke. “Did your grandmother know Tyler was there? I thought you said she denied it, and her inviting you there was to talk about buying your vote.”
“I don’t think she was lying. Presley and Wallace grabbed Tyler after Wallace killed Lex.
If I think about it, Presley was messing with drugging people.
I wonder if he persuaded Wallace to let him help then they were disturbed by Tyler.
” Sadness came with the memory of my friend.
Lex hadn’t had family or a partner. When we were clear of this mess, I’d do something to mark his memory.
Lovelyn said, “The crew is back in Deadwater. Arran’s returning here but Kane is going to the bunker to talk to Denise’s husband.
He’ll get their security stood down so they can call in Denise’s body and so they don’t come after any of us.
” She lifted her gaze from her phone. “We should prepare the video you took and get it over to Lyle. He called me this evening. The case is progressing. The timing is perfect.”
Mila’s voice came over the line. “Dixie, can I talk to you a minute?”
I shut myself in my bedroom to speak to her alone.
“The video implicates Primrose.” My sister took an audible breath. “I know this is crazy, but I don’t know if I can cause her more pain. Ever since we left there, I’ve been thinking about how she’d been trafficked. Trapped on a boat. No idea whether she’d live or die. That broke her.”
My heart hurt. “I know, sis. She went through something awful.”
“Then to have Austin obsessed with her. The pictures on the wall are a marker of that, aren’t they? How he saw her as a sex object. The woman he rescued but wouldn’t let go. She was trapped in their marriage, too.”
“It’s no justification for her murdering three people. That’s one hell of a mental health breakdown.”
“Wallace did the actual killing. Does she really have to go to jail? She’s elderly, and all she was trying to do was protect us. It was misguided, I know.”
Mila’s point of view didn’t shock me. I’d loved our grandmother once, too.
Her believing in me tonight had meant so much.
But that didn’t change what she was capable of.
“What if next time, she decides Convict is no good for you? If she overhears Lovelyn arguing with Kane, or she just decides a gang boy isn’t right for me? ”
“Or perhaps this was just because she couldn’t be there for us? It was a twisted form of love.”
“I don’t think she’s firing on all cylinders. Would you ever be able to trust her?”
Mila’s exhale told me of her sadness. “You’re right. God. She’ll go to prison.”
Probably, she would. Whatever happened next, it wasn’t ours to control anymore.
With Lovelyn’s help, I got the video ready.
Tyler returned from the hospital and came straight to me. “Ash is in surgery. His lower left leg is badly broken with a crush injury, but they are hopeful that it will heal fine. The prognosis is good.”
The tension in him finally snapped. He sagged against me. I held him.
“I’m so glad. Was Heretic there?”
“He showed up minutes after I did. Barely clean of blood but presentable. He wouldn’t speak to anyone. He also won’t leave Ash’s side.”
“They’re close.”
“Very much so. Even if it doesn’t always look that way.” He pulled back and regarded me, exhaustion in his eyes. “Want to go home?”
“Back to the ridge?”
He nodded. “All I want right now is a locked door and you.”
Sounded sweet to me.
We called out goodbyes and headed downstairs.
Arran intercepted us in the corridor. After checking Tyler was okay, he gave up a parting line. “Shade will have a surprise for you tomorrow.”
“He isn’t back?”
The gang leader poked his tongue into his cheek. “If you’d had the chance, you would’ve gone after the ex-con Jonas thought you were chasing.”
“Aye, but with a better plan than just running at him.”
“Shade’s doing it for you. He says that you can’t say he never gets you anything.”
After everything tonight, it felt unreal that anything else still waited for us.
Tyler seemed a little stunned too. Outside, he swung me into my seat, kissed me thoroughly, and drove us away. Whatever tomorrow would bring with the vote, the police, and any other trouble, tonight, nothing else mattered.