Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
I didn’t know how much time had passed. Ten minutes? Fifteen? Maybe it had been an hour and I couldn’t tell. Time moved and felt differently when adrenaline bumped through your whole body and your heart pounded out of fear in your chest.
The sound of glass crunching echoed in the hall near the kitchen. I stood up from behind the desk, gun aimed toward the foyer as I listened. I didn’t hear the sound of glass crunching again. Therefore, the only route Mr. X could take would be through the Jack-and-Jill bathroom. I pointed my gun toward there and waited.
“Is your heart racing like mine?” Mr. X said loudly from the back of the house. I couldn’t tell if he was down the hall or near the other entrance to the bathroom. “I’m enjoying myself so much, it’s tempting to leave so we can draw out this game we’re playing.”
“What a cowardly thing to do,” I said loudly as I stepped out from behind my mom’s desk and slowly walked across the room. “No wonder you have to kidnap young women to sleep with you.”
“I had to do that because you ran away from me!” he snarled.
Just as I was about to step into view of the entrance to the bathroom, I stilled. “You did that because you are nothing more than a pathetic, disgusting man who can’t tell the difference between reality and delusion.”
Finding courage, I leaned forward and looked in and through the bathroom. When I didn’t see him, I quickly moved toward the foyer. I led with my gun as I glanced down the hall. He wasn’t there, either.
The sound of something shattering came from the back of the house.
Is he leaving?
I moved back into my mom’s office and headed for the bathroom. Walking quickly but quietly, I went through the bathroom until I reached the hall that led to the mudroom and kitchen. When I stepped out into that hall, I’d be able to look slightly right and immediately see inside the kitchen’s entrance, while the entrance to the mudroom would be all the way to the right. I’d have to pick one to search first.
Before I moved out of the bathroom, I got the feeling like I was walking into a trap. That him breaking the glass had been his way to lure me out.
I backed up a step, unsure what to do. Then I heard glass crunch in the foyer.
How?
I rushed out into the hall, turned left, walked a few feet, and turned left again to see down the hall toward the front door. To my disbelief, Knox and Creed were standing in my foyer. Knox had his pistol aimed in front of him while Creed held a bat.
“How—” I was so shocked to see them, it was all that I could say.
The moment that word reached them, they looked at me.
Knox took a step toward me and crystal crunched under his foot. Frowning, he glanced down, and that was when I realized the mistake I had made. In my peripheral, I caught movement. I tried to dodge, but I felt the familiar pain of his knife cutting me from the top of my shoulder to my heart.
“Shiloh!” I heard Knox and Creed yell.
Mr. X slashed at me again and I had to hop backward. He went to slash again, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to dodge in time. I tried to aim my gun at him, but as I did, Keelan appeared behind him. He caught Mr. X by his wrist and wrapped his arm around his neck, putting him in a choke hold.
Keelan struggled to hold him, and I was too scared to shoot because one wrong move and I could end up shooting Keelan. Colt came out from behind Keelan and grabbed Mr. X’s other arm to help. Then Knox rushed to them and took over holding the arm Keelan had been struggling with. Creed came up next to me and I understood what I needed to do.
I gave Creed my gun and I pulled the knife out of my boot. I pushed Mr. X’s head back with my palm on his forehead. Keelan adjusted his hold by moving his arm from around his neck and hooking both of his arms under Mr. X’s armpits.
“Are you still enjoying yourself?” I asked him as I stared deep into his eyes. His dark depths used to be so terrifying and had haunted me for so long. Something seemed to change. It had to be me, because as I held his eyes, he wasn’t my demon or my boogeyman anymore. He was still a monster in a sense, but he was mostly just a man. One that was clearly pissed off. I had a feeling it had to do with who was holding him and the fact that no matter how much he thrashed against their hold, it was to no avail.
I cupped his chin and dug my fingers into his face around his mouth to hold him still. As I pressed the tip of my knife to the side of his neck, I said, “I am not yours. I never was.”
Knox leaned his head close to Mr. X’s ear and whispered, “She’s ours.”
Mr. X’s nostrils flared, and murderous rage filled his eyes as they rolled to look at Knox. With that one look, I saw what Mr. X wanted to do to Knox—to all four of them if he got free. Seeing that, my own rage took over me. I slammed my knife into his neck, twisted it, and then ripped it out.
Blood sprayed me and Knox and the floor. It spilled out of Mr. X’s neck far quicker than it had out of Shayla’s and when his legs buckled, my guys let him fall to the floor. Blood spread around him quickly and we all backed away from it.
When I saw Mr. X’s eyes go vacant, I felt safe enough to look away.
Not even a minute later, sirens became audible, quickly getting closer.
“I guess Ian finally got my message and called the police,” I said.
When EMS arrived, they found Logan unconscious in the attic. He was rushed to the hospital. I got to ride with him because I also needed to go for the large slash that stretched from my shoulder to the center of my chest.
Logan was rushed into surgery as soon as we got to the hospital. The doctors said he had internal bleeding in his abdomen. I was given a private room to get stitched up by a doctor and questioned by the police. I recognized one of the officers and he was familiar with my history with Mr. X.
A few hours passed and my adrenaline had finally crashed. I was alone and lying down when there was a knock on my room door. “Come in!” I called.
The door opened, revealing Keelan, followed by his brothers. I was so relieved to see them that I instantly started crying. Keelan and Colt rushed to either side of my bed. Colt took my hand and Keelan brushed loose hairs away from my forehead. Creed came to stand next to Colt and sat on the edge of my hospital bed. Knox stood at the foot of it.
“How did you know how to find me?” As soon as I asked that, I knew the answer. “You put the AirTag in my car. When did you do that?”
“When Knox and I went to go get dinner the night you took off,” Colt said.
“How—”
“When you gave me that speech about wanting to spend the rest of your life with us and wanting babies, Shi," Creed said, cutting me off. “How could we not know something was up?”
Knox gave Creed a look that screamed, Really? “You didn’t suspect a thing,” he told him. Then his gaze flicked back to me. “You had just told us X had Logan. Then I overheard you talking to Creed. You said the reason you told him about the future you wanted with us was so it would help him when he got upset. Meaning something was going to happen to upset him. That and the fact that you only said it to him tipped me off that you were going to run off on your own again.”
“That’s why you were gone for so long when you left to go get dinner,” I said.
Knox nodded, reached into the back pocket of his jeans, pulled out a phone that he must have bought when he’d gotten the AirTag, and showed me how they had been tracking me with an app.
I looked from Keelan to Colt. “How did you two get in the house? The windows and back door were nailed shut.”
“There was a broken window in the kitchen. We climbed through there,” Colt answered. That must have been the window Mr. X had broken to lure me to him.
“You know,” Keelan said, “just because the majority of us are calmer and more collected than Creed doesn’t mean that we weren’t just as upset that you left.”
“Hey!” Creed snapped.
Colt and Knox snorted.
“How mad are you with me?” I asked them.
Creed put his hand on the blanket where my thigh was. “You might not be able to sit for a while. I plan on spanking that ass hard every time I bend you over for the foreseeable future.”
That didn’t seem like a punishment to me. Not that I was going to tell him that. I wiped my wet cheeks. “I can truly promise to never do something like that again.”
“There isn’t a reason for you to run off and battle a serial killer by yourself anymore, babe,” Colt said.
“Has it sunk in yet that he’s gone?” Keelan asked.
I shook my head. “I keep waiting to wake up and realize that this is a dream.”
“You must feel something?” Knox asked.
I let out a heavy exhale. “I’m worried about Logan, but I am looking forward to going home and returning to our life. When I let myself think about it and how there won’t be this fear shadowing me everywhere, every minute, I feel free and a thousand pounds lighter.”
That made them smile.
“So in this future you want, how many babies are we having?” Keelan asked.
I blushed, blindsided by the question.
Keelan’s brows rose. “Would you look at that. I didn’t even say anything dirty.”
Their laughter filled the room, and it was beautiful.