24. Cash
24
CASH
I sip on the coffee cup in my hand while sliding the key card into Monroe’s door. I fell asleep on her sofa for a few hours. When I woke up, Duke was in the room, flirting with Ember, while Brooks was out grabbing lunch.
I left to stretch my legs, clear my head, and grab a quick shower in my and Duke’s room. He knows I’d make good on my many threats if he leaves Monroe’s suite before I get back. I only brought him because he’s a natural-born hunter. We’re not leaving until we catch this cocksucker and whoever’s helping him.
Once inside, I see Duke munching on a large cheese board with various meats, cheese, nuts, and dried fruits. I don’t recognize half of the stuff on it, but this is my first time in Switzerland. Ember must’ve gone to her room.
“She sleeping?”
“Yep. Haven’t heard a peep,” Duke says.
I look over. There’s a wall that blocks the view of her door from the main room. A janitor’s cleaning cart is parked right outside of it. The hotel employee in a navy uniform is finishing up mopping the hallways. I sip on my coffee, looking over at Duke as he lays back on the sofa, covering his eyes with his hat to take a nap.
Something has the hair on the back of my neck standing up.
“Where’s Brooks?”
“Sleeping. Ember said he was up most of the night.”
My brother slept on the plane, but we’re both jet-lagged. He gives up on attempting a nap, kicking his boots up on the coffee table and flipping through the channels.
The janitor moves away from Monroe’s door, replacing his mop in the cart. He slowly pushes it toward the door. I watch him walk toward the exit to leave.
“Did the doctor say it was okay for her to sleep this long?” Something is still gnawing at me.
“Ember checked in on her about an hour ago, and she was fine. Doc said, with a concussion, all we can do is wait it out.”
I move toward her room, turning the handle gently to avoid waking her. The sun has set, so the room is dark.
The bed is empty.
My stomach drops. I push into the room, peering around in the growing darkness. The bathroom door is open, but the light is off.
“Duke, get your ass in here.”
I step into the bathroom and flip the light on. My heart is thundering so loud in my ears that I can barely hear myself think. I walk through, looking around the white-and-black tiled bathroom .
She has to be in here.
“What’s wrong?” My brother speaks from behind me.
“Stay there.” I hold my hand up.
I go to the toilet room, knocking on the door. She could be getting sick again.
“Monroe?”
There’s no answer. I push it open and see that it’s empty.
“Cash,” Duke says.
I turn to see him standing in the shower, looking behind the half wall that covers the bench. He bends down. As I approach, I see her, huddled up in a tight ball beside the built-in bench. She has my hoodie pulled over her head. I left it on the bed for her before I went to shower.
He stands, face solemn as he moves out to give me space to enter. I crouch down beside her, tentatively reaching out to lay my hand over her trembling shoulder. Her toothbrush is on the tiled floor beside her.
“Blue, talk to me. What happened?”
She slowly rises, pushing up on her hands until she’s facing me. Her eyes are red-rimmed, tears spilling down her cheeks.
“He was here,” she whispers.
The blood drains from my face. I reach out to cup her under her arms and legs, lifting her up off the floor.
“Go find that janitor. I want to talk to him,” I say to Duke.
He turns on his heel and leaves.
Convincing her to cancel the next week of her tour was easier than I’d thought it would be. She’s been silent and unmoving since we flew out of Switzerland. The authorities seemed to take the case very seriously, but the man posing as a janitor had no affiliation with the hotel. They didn’t even know how he was able to access a universal key card to all the rooms. They have camera footage of him entering and exiting through the employee entrance, but nothing was found to help identify him.
I’m studying the blurry screenshot of him in the video on my phone as Monroe’s private plane lands in Texas. I look up at her to see the familiar blank stare she’s had since that stalker made it into her bathroom. She could’ve screamed for help and Duke would’ve heard, but she froze. She told me that she panicked and couldn’t speak. She said all he did was touch her cheek and leave.
Her face is turned toward the window, studying the Texas landscape, stretching as far as the eye can see. She’s dressed in a designer white sweatsuit with her hair up in a messy bun. I haven’t seen her smile in three days.
Guilt has plagued me relentlessly. I have yet to leave her side again. I was gone twenty minutes, but even when I got back to the room, I let the motherfucker walk right past me. Guilt has been gnawing me alive from the inside out.
Duke said he never saw the man go into her room. He came to mop up and take the soiled laundry. Duke was sitting on the couch the whole time. He said the guy must’ve silently gone in her room when his back was turned. Monroe’s soiled pajamas were nowhere to be found, which means the sicko probably stole them. My clothes were left in a heap in the bathroom corner.
I can’t blame my brother. He felt like shit for it, but it wasn’t his fault. I let the fucker go too. He waltzed right in, easily escaping suspicion while pretending to be there to clean up. He must have heard about the call for a cleanup when Ember requested it from the front desk. He silently slipped into Monroe’s room, planning God knows what. Her freezing up instead of screaming was a lucky break for him and the only reason he’s still breathing.
I should never have left her side.
Fighting my feelings and complicated attraction to her has been exhausting, but now, I’m more worried about her mental state than anything. Suggesting Redford Ranch as her hideaway was my first choice—not only for her safety, but because there’s nothing quite as healing for the mind as sitting on our back porch next to a fire with a glass of wine and a view of the wheat fields and grazing cattle.
We land at a private airstrip almost an hour from the ranch. The pilot gives the clear button for us to move about the cabin. I stand, reaching for Monroe’s tote bag. She steps out ahead of me once the stairs are lowered.
My brother’s black dually truck is idling on the tarmac about fifty yards away. He pulls forward when he sees us. I convinced Monroe’s team that for her to truly recover from this traumatizing event, she needed to be alone. Ember was the hardest to convince. Fidel tried to push Monroe to let Danny come with us when we landed in New York and split off from the rest of the team, but she sided with me on the fact that the ranch was safe enough to only need me and my brothers as protection.
At the end of the day, I simply refused to budge on any of it. Due to her concussion and the stalker’s sudden appearance, the record label agreed some time off was necessary. I was ready to burn their shiny LA skyscraper to the ground if they put up a fight.
“You folks need a lift?” Holden calls through the open window of his truck.
“Come help us with the bags, dickhead,” Duke calls as he hauls one of Monroe’s suitcases over his shoulder.
“You look like you can handle it,” Holden says, drumming his fingers on the side of the door. He’s wearing a beat-up straw cowboy hat.
I lead Monroe over to the truck and open the door for her. “You remember my brother Holden.”
“Hello,” she says. Her voice is noticeably flat.
“Howdy, ma’am.”
I resist the urge to go so far as to buckle her into the back seat. She places her hands in her lap and leans her head back against the headrest.
“I’m going to help Duke get the bags.”
She nods, not meeting my eyes. I turn and close her door to help my brother. Breathing is a little easier now that we’re back in familiar territory. Trying to keep someone like her safe in a foreign country, where everyone was screaming her name, was the most stressful thing I’d ever lived through. Now that we’re with my family, I feel a sense of peace with my brothers’ presence and the arsenal of firearms we have stocked up at home .
Holden is ruthless. He’s already murdered men for hurting his fiancée and our little sister, Dolly. He’s not the kind of man anyone fucks with.
We finish with the bags and load up in the truck. I climb into the back seat with Monroe, leaving the middle seat between us.
Duke hops into the passenger seat and claps Holden’s shoulder. “I’m ready for a brewski.”
We pass the hour drive with Holden and Duke catching up on the ranch and bull riding business. Our main income is cattle sales and hunting leases, but we also supply bulls to an underground bull riding ring.
“We got a new round of bulls to test tomorrow morning,” Holden says as we pull into the long driveway of Redford Ranch.
“I’m sleeping in,” Duke says.
“No, you’re not.” Holden parks the truck in front of the bunkhouse.
I asked my sister to prepare the bunkhouse for me and Monroe to stay in together. I physically can’t leave her again, and I don’t need Duke flirting with her when she’s vulnerable.
The guys help us unload her many suitcases and stack them right inside the living room. Seeing the house through Monroe’s eyes, I feel like it’s more rustic and primitive than I previously thought. She’s accustomed to luxury suites and penthouse hotel rooms.
“Dolls and Rosie stocked the fridge for you. You gonna show up for bull testing?” Holden asks from the threshold.
I nod. “Thanks. Yeah, I’ll be there. ”
He studies me for a moment, his knowing eyes glancing from me to the celebrity standing in our modest kitchen. He pauses, a smirk crossing his lips before he steps out onto the porch. “Night.”
He slams the door shut, leaving us alone. Tension immediately stiffens the air. I move to the door to remove my boots. When I turn back around, Monroe is studying a large elk head mounted on the wall. I blow out a long breath.
She probably thinks we’re uncivilized beasts.
“Let me show you to your room.”
I lead her to the nicest room in the bunkhouse. It has a four-poster queen-sized bed with a frilly pink bedspread on it that I’ve never seen before. An array of matching pillows is lined up across it. A little basket of toiletries is sitting on the nightstand. A throw blanket with pink and white bows all over it is draped across the leather chair in the corner.
I owe Dolly and Rosie big time for this.
“Well, this is it. I, uh, I know it’s not the same as The Ritz and?—”
She stops me with a heat-searing hand on my forearm. “It’s perfect. I can never thank you enough for bringing me here with your family …” She sucks in a shaky breath. “And I’m never going to be able to pay you back for this. You’re so lucky to have somewhere like this to go, to call home.”
Her blue eyes are shiny with tears. I might have to go out and ask Duke to hit me if she cries right now because I can’t take another drop of being responsible for her emotional damage. All I can manage is a nod toward the bathroom.
“There’s the bathroom. I’m just down the hall if you need anything at all, or if you can’t sleep, you can just … just come wake me up.”
She nods, folding her arms over her chest. “Can I see your room?”
I hesitate for a moment before leading her to the room down the hall. It’s much simpler and more masculine, but it’s clean. She studies every aspect of the room, not knowing I usually sleep in the one she’s in, minus the ruffles.
“So, if anyone breaks in …” she starts, chewing her bottom lip.
“No one can get to you. I’d never let that happen. That’s why I brought you here.” I move closer to her, looking down into her eyes. “But if you’re afraid …”
“I’ll come to you,” she says, nodding.
“Yes.”
“Okay, well, good night then.” She turns, walking back to her room.
I watch her step into it and shut the door. I stare at the door, feeling all the rage and fear coursing through me from what happened over the last three days.
I will keep her safe here. I can’t fail. She’s depending on me.