CHAPTER 29
Anna
A cacophony of muffled voices swirled around me as I slowly regained consciousness, dragging me up from the depths of drugged oblivion. The fog lifted from my mind in fits and starts, reality seeping back in fragments that didn't quite fit together yet.
I lay perfectly still, every muscle tense despite my attempts to seem relaxed. The pounding in my head was relentless, a bass drum beating against the inside of my skull in rhythm with my pulse. It gradually dulled to a throbbing ache that made my temples sting and my stomach twist with nausea.
I couldn't risk moving. I had to prevent them from knowing I was awake.
As awareness seeped back in like water through cracks, I became acutely aware of the searing pain encircling my wrists and ankles.
The sensation was sharp and burning. Rope, rough and unyielding, biting into my skin with every minuscule movement.
My shoulders ached from being pulled back at an unnatural angle, arms bound behind me around something solid and immovable.
I'm tied up.
Memories flickered through my mind like a disjointed film reel, images flashing without context or order.
Chester's frantic barking. His nails scraping desperately against the wood.
A shadow moving behind me. The violent impact of my face slamming against the wall, the explosion of pain.
The sharp sting of a needle piercing my shoulder, cold liquid spreading beneath my skin.
They'd drugged me. Someone drugged me and brought me—where?
My heart raced, the sound thunderous in my ears, and I fought to keep my breathing slow and even. If they realized I was awake, I didn't know what they'd do. The fear of the unknown was almost worse than the pain itself.
At first, I'd been certain Daniel had finally come for me, that after all this time, all these weeks of hiding, he'd found me and this was his punishment for running.
But then, fragments surfaced. A flash of blonde hair, not dark. A fleeting glimpse of a face that looked eerily like Jaxon's just before everything went black.
As I pieced together the scattered images, forcing my drugged brain to function through the haze, more details began to register.
The ropes weren't just tight, they were suffocating, making it difficult to breathe normally.
Each shallow inhale expanded my ribcage against the restraints, sending new waves of pain through my torso.
The surface beneath me was hard. Wood, maybe. Cold and unyielding against my side where I lay. The air smelled familiar and clean, like old timber and fresh air, undercut with something faintly metallic that turned my stomach.
I needed to focus, to listen, to figure out where I was.
The voices around me grew sharper as the fog continued to thin, the indistinct murmur splitting into words and tones.
Despite every instinct screaming at me to open my eyes, to see where I was and who had me, I forced myself to remain motionless.
My breaths stayed shallow and even, mimicking the rhythm of unconsciousness.
Information was survival.
"You think he's just going to hand over the money after you left a note basically admitting to murdering his fiancée?"
The voice came from somewhere behind me, male, familiar in a way that made my skin crawl. The tone was sneering, dripping with disdain and something that might've been fear disguised as bravado.
It was Jared.
My heart skipped a beat as realization crashed into me with sickening clarity.
Jared had been there in the hallway. That's why I'd thought I'd seen Jaxon before blacking out. They had similar builds, similar heights. In my drugged, panicked state, I'd mistaken Jared for his brother.
Oh God. Jared took me.
His earlier threats at the cookout echoed in my mind, taking on a chilling new weight. The drug dealers coming after Jaxon if he didn't pay up. The desperation in Jared's eyes when Jaxon had thrown him out.
But had I heard him correctly just now? Through the remaining haze in my mind, had those words really been—
The drug dealers killed Nikki?
Bile rose in my throat, hot and acidic. Not a random robbery. Not wrong place, wrong time.
Murder. Deliberate, calculated murder.
"Yes, Jared. I think he will," an unfamiliar voice replied.
Cold, calm, and terrifyingly controlled.
The kind of voice that made every hair on my body stand on end.
The tone was smooth, measured. The voice of someone used to being obeyed.
Someone dangerous. Someone who hurt people without hesitation.
"Especially considering I have her here. I think he'll be smart enough to avoid losing someone else."
Me. He was talking about me. I was the leverage.
The casual way he spoke, discussing me as leverage, a bargaining chip, ignited a flicker of rage beneath the fear. But I kept my body limp, my breathing steady, even as every muscle screamed to move, to fight, to run.
"Isaac, this is a bad idea. Jaxon isn't stupid—"
Jared's protest was abruptly silenced by the sickening crack of flesh meeting flesh. A heavy, meaty sound that made me flinch inwardly. A grunt of pain followed, then the scrape of shoes against wood as someone stumbled.
"Of course he isn't the stupid one. You are, as I've learned the hard way." Isaac's voice cut through the air like a blade—sharp, cold, deliberate. I heard heavy footsteps pacing the floor, back and forth like a caged animal, each pass punctuated by the creak of old boards.
Wooden floors. The smell of old wood and fresh air. This had to be Jaxon's cabin, or at least one of the ones on Connor’s ranch.
"You're the reason his fiancée is dead in the first place. You were the one who told me to go to his house to find the money." The words struck like physical blows, each one another piece of the puzzle locking into place—horrifying and undeniable.
Jared set up the robbery. Jared got Nikki killed.
"And not to mention," Isaac continued, voice icy, "you thought burning that cabin down would get him to come home so you could force it out of him."
The fire. Jared started the fire at the cabin. Did he seriously think that would make Jaxon stop staying at Connor’s with me and go back to his place? Jared muttered something low and defensive, but Isaac wasn't finished.
"And let's not forget when you tried to spy on him here, making him more guarded from the start, because you thought it was a good idea to scare a horse into the woods."
The accident with the Choco when I was at Jaxon’s. That was Jared too? My head spun, the remnants of the drug making it hard to keep up, but the revelations kept coming like hammer blows.
"And then it was your idea to trash the place and just try to find the money yourself." The break-in. They were looking for the money Jaxon supposedly had.
The weight of their revelations crashed over me like a tidal wave, each word slamming into my already pounding skull.
The secrets they spilled so carelessly, thinking I was unconscious, thinking I couldn't hear, hit harder than any blow.
The trauma they'd inflicted on Jaxon, the torment they now sought to use against him again.
They killed Nikki. They've been tormenting Jaxon. And now they're using me.
It was almost too much to bear. The magnitude of what they'd done, what they were planning, the sheer cruelty of it all.
Bile burned the back of my throat, but I swallowed it down, forcing my body to stay limp and lifeless. Every muscle trembled with the strain of pretending, the effort of keeping still when every instinct screamed at me to fight, to run.
I focused on my breathing. I wouldn't give myself away—I refused to.
Despite the fear coursing through me like ice water, one truth rooted itself deep inside me: Jaxon would come for me.
He would move heaven and earth to find me, to bring me back to safety. I'd seen it in his eyes when he held me, when he made love to me, when he whispered promises against my skin. That wasn't a man who would ever abandon me to this fate.
I just had to stay alive until he did.
All I had to do was survive long enough for him to reach me. That was it. Just survive.
So I lay there, trapped in a waking nightmare, my heart hammering so loudly I was sure they could hear it. I clung to the image of Jaxon's face like a lifeline in a storm. His blue eyes, his crooked smile, the way he looked at me like I was everything.
I had to see him again.
I would endure whatever it took. I would play possum for as long as I had to. Because the alternative—giving up, letting them win, letting them hurt Jaxon more than they already had—was unthinkable.
I focused on my breathing, each inhale and exhale an act of quiet defiance against the men who wanted to break me. In through my nose, slow and steady. Out through parted lips, measured and even.
I survived Daniel. I escaped an abusive relationship, rebuilt my life from nothing, learned to trust again. I wasn't that broken woman who fled in the night months ago.
And I would make damn sure they lived to regret the day they ever laid a hand on me.
Jaxon
I gently tugged on the reins, signaling for Choco to halt. We'd reached the point on the trail where the cabin came into view through the trees, its weathered exterior blending seamlessly with the surrounding forest, as if it had grown there naturally instead of being built.
With a soft grunt, I dismounted. My boots hit the ground with a muffled thud that still sounded too loud despite the cushion of pine needles beneath me.
I led Choco carefully off the trail and deeper into the undergrowth, the dense foliage forming a natural screen from prying eyes.
Branches caught at my clothes as we pushed through, and the sharp green scent of crushed ferns filled the air.