Chapter Nineteen
Hailey
Marlena Kade is a psychopath with impeccable taste in bedding. That’s the first coherent thought I have when I wake up alone,
wrapped in sheets I want to hate but can’t.
Morning light streams through the floor-to-ceiling windows, making the snow outside glitter like crushed diamonds. I lie there
for a moment, listening. Knox and Liam are already up, their low voices drifting from somewhere near the kitchen. The cabin
is one big open space—living area flowing into kitchen flowing into the bedroom nook where I’m currently cocooned—so I can
hear every word even if I can’t make them out.
Whatever they’re saying, it doesn’t sound friendly.
I drag myself out of bed and find clothes laid out on the dresser. More of Marlena’s handiwork.
No. No no no.
I hold up the sweater. It’s pink. Not even a cool dusty rose or something I could pretend is ironic. It’s the color of cotton candy. Of baby showers. Of everything
I’ve spent my adult life avoiding.
The jeans are fine, I guess. Light wash, which is a crime, but at least they’re not bedazzled. There’s a cream-colored cardigan
as backup, cashmere and delicate and absolutely not anything I would ever voluntarily put on my body.
I dig through the dresser drawers hoping for something—anything—in black. A T-shirt. Socks. A goddamn scrunchie.
Nothing. Every item is soft and pastel and makes me want to set something on fire. Marlena has curated an entire wardrobe of things specifically designed to make me look like I’m about to brunch in the Hamptons.
I pull on the pink sweater because the alternative is freezing, and it fits perfectly. Of course it does. The woman kidnapped
us with personalized wardrobes.
When I pad toward the kitchen, Knox is at the counter, a steak knife in his hand. He’s not cutting anything. He’s working
the blade into the window frame, trying to wedge it into the seal.
Liam sits on the arm of the couch, watching him with his arms crossed.
Knox glances up when I approach, and his mouth twitches.
“Nice sweater.”
“Shut up.”
“Very soft. Very . . .” He tilts his head. “Cute.”
“I will stab you with that knife.”
Liam’s watching me now too, and there’s a grin spreading across his face that I don’t like at all. “Is that pink?”
“It’s the only option. Everything in that dresser looks like it belongs to a sorority girl.”
“You look like you’re about to ask me if I want to join your book club.” Liam’s grin widens. “Maybe bake some muffins. Organize
a charity fun run.”
“I hate you both.”
“The color really brings out your eyes,” Knox adds, completely deadpan.
“I hope Marlena kills you first.”
I grab a mug from the cabinet and pour myself coffee from the pot someone already made, trying to ignore the fact that I can
see my reflection in the window and I look like a J.Crew catalog threw up on me.
“Any luck?” I ask Knox, nodding at the knife.
“The seal is some kind of industrial polymer. I’ve been at it for twenty minutes and haven’t made a dent.” He sets the knife down, frustration evident in the set of his shoulders. “The glass is shatter-resistant. I could work on it for a week and not get through.”
“So we’re stuck.”
“For now.”
Liam pushes off from the couch and walks toward the bathroom. Knox tracks his movement without turning his head. I can see
the line of his jaw tighten when Liam passes behind him.
Ten days. We have ten days to survive this cabin without killing each other.
I take a long sip of coffee and wish it were whiskey.
The next hour passes in silence that gets progressively louder. Knox tries a different knife on a different window. Liam paces
by the windows like a caged animal. I pretend to be interested in a book I grabbed from the shelf, but I haven’t absorbed
a single word. The pages might as well be blank.
Knox is working on the window near the kitchen when Liam walks past him to refill his coffee.
Their shoulders collide.
Not hard. Not even particularly aggressive. But the contact is like a match dropped in gasoline.
Knox turns. “Watch it.”
“You’re in the way.” Liam doesn’t stop walking. “Some of us are trying to move around.”
“I’m trying to get us out of here. What are you doing? Oh, right. Nothing. Just like always.”
Liam freezes mid-stride. When he turns around, his expression has gone flat in a way I recognize from our years working together.
That’s his dangerous face. The one he wears right before everything goes sideways.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’re good at showing up when you need something and disappearing when things get hard.” Knox straightens to his
full height, which is considerable. “Over a decade, Liam. Not even a message.”
My coffee mug hovers halfway to my mouth. I should intervene. I should say something, do something, diffuse whatever this is before it detonates.
I don’t move.
“I couldn’t,” Liam says. “You know why.”
“Enlighten me.”
“Afghanistan. The things we didn’t say. I thought distance would be easier.”
“Bullshit.”
Knox moves closer, and there’s something almost magnetic about it. Like he can’t help himself. Like Liam is pulling him in
even as they’re pushing each other away.
“You just didn’t care enough to deal with it. Easier to run.”
Liam’s hands curl into fists at his sides. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I know you brought Hailey into a trap. I know you’re pushing to hand over the diamond to a woman who’s clearly unhinged.
And I know there’s something you’re not telling us.”
“Back off, Knox.”
“Make me.”
They’re chest to chest now. Close enough to feel each other’s breath. Close enough that whatever’s crackling between them
has nothing to do with the fight.
I’ve seen men fight before. I’ve seen the way violence builds, the way it broadcasts itself in squared shoulders and clenched
jaws. This isn’t that. This is something else.
Knox shoves Liam. Hard. Liam stumbles back a step, then comes forward and shoves back harder. Knox’s fist cocks back, ready
to swing, and his whole body is a loaded weapon, and Liam’s not backing down, and they’re about to tear into each other like
animals, and—
“ENOUGH.”
I’m between them before I’ve consciously decided to move. My hands hit their chests simultaneously, shoving them apart with all the force I can muster. They separate, barely, still vibrating with unspent violence.
“What the hell is wrong with you two?” I’m shouting now, and I don’t care. “We’re trapped in here for ten days and you’re
going to beat the shit out of each other on day one?”
Knox is breathing hard, his gaze still locked on Liam over my shoulder. “He’s hiding something.”
“So ask him instead of starting a fight!”
I whirl on Liam, keeping one hand planted firmly on Knox’s chest. I can feel his heartbeat through the fabric. Rapid. Furious.
“And you.” I jab a finger at Liam. “Stop deflecting every time he questions you. If you have nothing to hide, then act like
it.”
Something shutters behind Liam’s eyes. “There’s nothing to tell.”
“Then stop acting guilty!”
I look between them, my own anger building to match theirs. Two grown men who can’t be in the same room without combusting.
Two soldiers who survived god knows what together and can’t seem to survive each other.
“We have one chance to get through this,” I say. “One. And it requires us working together. So whatever this is?” I gesture
at the space between them. “Fix it.”
Neither of them moves.
Knox’s chest is still heaving under my palm. His eyes haven’t left Liam’s face. And Liam is staring right back, jaw set, his
composure cracking open at the seams.
There’s a look on Liam’s face that snags my attention. I can’t name it exactly, but I’ve known Liam for years. I know his
moods, his tells, the way he holds himself differently around people who get under his skin. I saw it in Barcelona, in that
club where he spent three hours watching a bartender before disappearing into the back room. I saw it in Prague, the way he
couldn’t stop glancing at the locksmith who helped us with that job. Liam’s attraction to men was never a secret between us.
But that’s Liam. And whatever this is between them feels more complicated than simple want. There’s history here, from their military days, that neither of them has told me about. An old wound tearing open.
Knox catches me studying them and immediately shutters his expression. He’s good at that. Walls up in an instant, every emotion
filed away behind that disciplined exterior. Whatever just passed between him and Liam, it’s already locked down.
“You two need to figure out how to coexist,” I say, stepping back from both of them. “I don’t care if you like each other.
I don’t care if you hate each other. But this?” I gesture at the wreckage of their almost-fight. “This can’t happen again.
Not if we want to survive ten days in this box.”
Knox exhales hard through his nose. Liam shoves his hands in his pockets, looking anywhere but at either of us.
“I mean it,” I say. “Whatever history you have? Whatever grudge you’re carrying? Table it. We deal with Marlena first. Everything
else comes second.”
Silence. The fire pops in the grate. Outside, wind presses against the windows like it’s testing for weakness.
“Fine,” Knox says.
Liam lifts one shoulder in a shrug that barely qualifies. “Fine.”
They don’t look at each other when they say it.
I drop onto the couch. Part of me wants to scream. Part of me can’t shake the feeling that I’m only seeing the surface of
what’s between these two. But I’m too tired and too furious to chase it right now.
Knox is the first to step back. He runs a hand through his hair, that tell of his that means he’s trying to regain control.
Liam mirrors the movement, putting distance between them, but the air has changed. Whatever wall was between them just came
down.
I take a breath, forcing myself to calm down. Focus on what matters.
“Knox. What were you going to ask him? Before you started swinging?”
Knox’s gaze slides to Liam. Holds there. “Afghanistan. He said he left because of things we didn’t say. I want to know what
that means.”