36. Rhett
Rhett
A fter the gym I find Ana in the cinema room fast asleep while a movie plays. It invokes such peace in me to watch her delicate face as she’s curled into Shadow. I grab a blanket and fit it over her, leaning in to kiss her head. She doesn’t stir, so I leave her and head up to shower.
I’ve just come out and changed into black jeans and a plain black T-shirt when my phone rings with a particular tone.
“Hey, Allie.” I pick up on the second ring.
“Rhett.” Her quiet voice slams my steps still.
“What’s wrong?” I say, immediately recoiling as dread sharpens my senses.
“I-I found the missing sapphire earrings.” My adrenaline beats my pulse, quieting my world as she says, “I’m looking at them.”
“Fuck.” I’m throwing on my leather jacket in the same breath and out of my room in seconds. “Just a minute,” I say, switching to my earpiece and pocketing my phone.
The dining room is empty, so I head to the senator’s office. He’s typing away as I knock and enter brazenly.
“Agent, is everything okay?”
“I have a family emergency,” I rush out. “I wouldn’t dare ask if it wasn’t urgent. I wouldn’t ask for time away from protecting Ana if I had another choice.”
My chest, my mind, my fucking soul aches at the thought. But Allie is a target in real danger right now.
“Of course, son. Do what you have to and take a car if you need to. I’ll have your placement covered in the meantime.”
“Thank you, sir,” I say, and I don’t have a second to spare before I’m sprinting to the garage and slipping into the black SUV.
I checked Allie’s location on the way, cursing that she was in Boston eight fucking hours away.
She’s still on the line as I say, “Lock yourself somewhere. I’m coming for you.”
Her small gasp slams in my fucking chest. I speed the car out the garage.
“There’s no time. I think someone’s here,” she whispers.
“Allie, can you hide? Can you get out of that house and find somewhere safe, please?”
“There’s no time. Listen to me, Rhett. There’s something else you need to know, and you can’t leave Ana right now.
Adam Sullevan wasn’t the one who attacked her at the fair.
He was at least an hour away. Traffic across the city was terrible and he wasn’t going to make it in time.
I’ve confirmed his location at a club that whole night. ”
There’s a crash in the background and my fists tighten on the wheel painfully.
“I don’t care right now. Where are you?”
“I-I’m hiding,” she whispers carefully. “But they’re going to find me.”
A violent scream is building inside me. I can’t lose Allie. She can’t be in this fucking mess because of me.
“Don’t come, Rhett,” she pleads softly. “I might have the missing sapphire earrings someone has paid for, but Ana ... she’s the ruby. She has been all this time, and you know these debts won’t go unfulfilled no matter what it takes.”
My insides are tearing apart, my mind strains toward insanity with two opposite directions to follow. How could I not have seen it sooner? The price tag stamped “SOLD” that’s been on my little bird all this time. I want to burn the gala venue and all those inside it to the ground.
“They’re coming for me to separate you. They know you’ll try to save me.”
I won’t be forced to choose. I won’t be forced to choose.
FUCK.
My rage is so hot and tangible I don’t know what to do. How to possibly fucking live with either decision.
“Hang tight, Allie,” I say as softly as I can for her terror. “You’re going to be okay.”
Taking out another phone, I dial Rix.
“Dude! I’ve been trying to reach you! We’re in deep fucking shit, man?—”
“Allie’s in imminent danger. As in I need whoever is in the area to get there right. Fucking. Now.”
“Shit, on it.”
“They’re here,” Allie whispers in pure terror.
“We’re coming, Allie. Be brave, love. If they harm a hair on your head they’re going to pay for it in ways that’ll make them beg for death.”
I’m helpless. Completely fucking wrecked to be on the line when she cries, finally found. All I hear is a struggle and the taunting voices of two wicked men. I’m right back to the night of Christmas Eve four years ago. An utterly defeated, lost, and weak man.
“We’re coming for you,” I whisper. Then the line cuts off and I yell anguish into the car. Pure raw fury that pumps the accelerator.
“I’m sorry man,” Rix says, as broken as I feel.
“Tell me we can track her.”
“She’s smart. I’m just waiting for her damn clever sign and I’ll be on her faster than a knife fight in a phone booth.”
“Good,” I grind out.
“You should go back to Ana. Did Allie tell you?—?”
“Yes.”
“She sold for over twenty million, Rhett. It’s record-breaking. I’m surprised they haven’t come for her yet.”
My little bird is no one’s to sell. No one’s to own but mine .
I will find whoever thought they had a chance of having her and make sure they know Anastasia Kinsley is fucking priceless.
Then I’ll find Jacob Forthson for orchestrating the sale and let him watch his empire burn before I throw him to the flames without his flesh.
I’m driving on autopilot, about to turn around as I’m better served here, closer to the most important thing to me, and Xoid will find Allie within the day or I’ll raise hell personally.
But I’ve learned by a cruel and merciless deliverance before how fast fate can switch.
That no hour is granted ...
No minute is gifted . . .
It takes less than one minute for the speeding car to my right to slam into the back side of the SUV and obliterate the world around me.
All I feel is pain, but it quickly turns too consistent and I can’t pinpoint where on my body is broken or sliced.
All I can hear is crash after crash, and it becomes too constant to track what’s happening.
All I can see is an endless, torturous black.
Then nothing.
For a few seconds it’s as stilling as death.
Until I fight for consciousness.
For a flash of red hair and the brightest smile.
For a laugh that is my song.
A touch that is my heaven.
For Ana, I want the pain that returns punishingly as if my flesh has been cut a thousand times.
I manage to unclip my belt with a violently trembling hand.
Blood rushes to my head and I brace for the fall when I’m no longer strapped in.
I grit my teeth through the explosion happening inside my head and lancing across my ribs.
Glass cuts deep, but I have to make it out.
For my little bird I have to make it.
I’m coming back, baby. I chant to myself.
She’ll understand. She’ll say it’s not my fault when that isn’t the truth. Everything is my fault, and once again I’ve put everything I love in the line of fire by letting her get close to me.
I’m going to marry Anastasia Kinsley.
I’m going to buy my wife that damned house with the porch. Or build it from the fucking ground so it faces the view she wants.
She’s going to have my children someday and grow old with my hand in hers.
I paint that future in the blood that spills from me now. I promise that to her with all that I am as I crawl from the wreckage. And I’ll crawl all the way back to her like this if that’s what it takes.
“It’s been far too long,” a voice says.
One so deep and haunting. One that will never erase itself from my mind, just like it’s never left my nightmares no matter how much time has passed.
“I apologize for the methods, but you’ll fix right back up, nephew. You always do.”