Chapter Thirty
KINLEY
I’M NOT sure which uncomfortable sensation is the one that actually wakes me up, they both are vying for my attention equally, but my foot is aching, and I have to pee so bad I’m about to wet myself.
I look next to me, but Rhys isn’t there, so I push myself up onto my elbow and see him dozing in a chair by the window.
The closet door is open just a crack to light the room enough for him to see me. I look over his handsome face and think of him taking care of me all day yesterday. His gentleness and his attentiveness warmed my chest every time he went out of his way to make me comfortable.
I don’t remember coming to the bed, he must have carried me. When he picked me up yesterday and walked to the pool, he scooped me up like I weighed nothing.
He’s so hot.
He’s fully dressed in black fatigue pants and a short-sleeve shirt that is stretched across his chest. His combat-boot covered feet are propped on the corner of the bed, and his laptop is on his legs.
There’s no screen light shining on him, so he’s been asleep long enough that it’s gone to sleep as well.
Slowly, I move the blankets off me and look around for the crutches the hospital gave me yesterday. They must still be in the living room. The boot on my foot is awkward to pull out of the sheets, and I quietly limp to the bathroom, trying not to wake Rhys up.
My foot aches like hell, but I’m not taking any more of those pain pills. I don’t remember half of what I said after he brought me to the cabin. They must be super strong, I’ve never had that reaction to others I’ve taken before. I’ll take my chances with ibuprofen.
In the kitchen, the numbers on the microwave say it’s two-thirty. Still a long time until morning, and I’m not sleepy anymore. The last time I looked at the time last night, I think it was eight o’clock, and I usually function on five or six hours.
Even if I can’t go back to sleep, I’m not taking any more of those damn pills.
My mouth feels like a sandbox, so I grab a bottle of water out of the fridge and drink half of it, the cold water like a rainstorm on the desert that is my tongue.
Normally I would only take two ibuprofen for a headache, but I pop four into my mouth and wash them down with the rest of the bottle of water.
Thunder rumbles outside and, less than a minute later, lightning lights up the sky. Storms coming. Leaving the dim LED light strip on under the counter, I limp into my studio to look out the windows to see if it looks like it’s going to be bad.
It’s pitch black outside. The stars and the moon are hidden by the clouds, and I stand on one foot by the floor to ceiling windows to watch the lightning show that is happening across the sky.
It’s beautiful.
Maybe in the next few days, I can try to replicate the beauty of the rods of light traveling through the clouds on a canvas. I think the biggest challenge will be capturing the glow of the lightning inside of the clouds.
More thunder rumbles and ends with a sharp clap across the sky that makes me jump. The smell of chlorine floats up to my nose, and I realize I never took that shower before the pain pills knocked me out last night.
Another bolt of lightning lights up the sky, and the hairs on my neck stand up, making my heart flip in my chest. I feel like I’m being watched, and my eyes jump around the backyard of the cabin to see if I can see anyone.
I slowly back away from the window to go get Rhys when a hand covers my mouth and cold, hard metal presses into my ribs. My stomach drops as a body steps to my back and the hand tightens over my mouth, pushing my head into a hard chest.
His head dips next to mine, and warm breath moves across my cheek as a deep voice next to my ear says, “Hey there, blondie. That was some quick moving yesterday. How’s the foot?”
That voice. It’s Sanders, the asshole that came to my house.
Fixing my sights on the canvas next to me, I focus on taking even breaths through my nose and not letting the panic muddle my thoughts. I have to stay calm. It doesn’t help that his hand smells like cheap cologne and metal.
Another bolt of lightning flashes, and the light glints on the metal tip of one of my palette knives I use for texture painting. It’s within reach, I have to do it right, or he may just shoot me.
With a quiet inhale, I jerk my hand to the side. His hand over my mouth tightens and presses my lip into my teeth, but I grab the biggest one from the cup and jab it into his leg.
He lets go of me with a growl. “Fucking bitch!”
I twist away from him, but I lose my balance on my one foot and fall to the ground. The gun swings in my direction as he grabs the handle of the knife to pull it out. When he looks down at his thigh, I scramble to the side on my hands and knees to hide.
“Drop it, Sanders.” Rhys’ deep voice sounds lethal on the other side of Sanders.
I peek around the other easel to see Rhys standing in the doorway from the kitchen with his gun pointed at Sanders’ head. The metallic taste of blood is on my tongue, and I can feel my bottom lip starting to swell.
Sanders lifts his hands and lets his gun fall slack around his finger just before Rhys steps up behind him, pressing his gun to Sanders’ head and grabbing it to tuck it in the back of his pants.
“Kinley!” Rhys barks.
“Here.” I say and stand up on one foot.
“Come here, baby.” His voice is firm and commanding, and I hobble to him. “Are you hurt?”
“Uh-uh.” My cut lip isn’t worth the attention.
His arm goes around my waist to hold me next to him. “He didn’t hurt you?” His eyes are moving between me and Sanders as he tries to look up and down my body.
“She fucking stabbed me, asshole. I wasn’t going to hurt her.” Sanders growls over his shoulder and clamps his hand over the bleeding gash in his leg.
“Shut the fuck up.” Rhys snarls at him. “You mean like you didn’t hurt Swan?”
“Fuck you.” Sanders snaps back at him. “I never wanted to be a part of this in the first place.”
“Oh, yeah? What does it take to get an agent to turn coat these days?” Rhys grits through his teeth.
Sanders takes a deep breath. “Dunn caught me fudging fucking numbers on my reports and skimming some of the money in evidence, told me I had to help him or he’d report me with his own set of charges.”
“You thought killing another agent was better than going to fucking jail?” Rhys yells in disbelief.
“The kind of jail Dunn threatened to send me to? With the charges he said he would fabricate? I would be a dead man, anyway.”
“I’ve always thought you were one stupid motherfucker, Sanders. Get down on your knees and put your hands behind your head.” Rhys tells him, his arm a tight vice around my waist.
Thunder rumbles loud over us and within seconds lightning flashes across the sky, lighting up the entire room. Sanders slowly lowers himself to his knees and puts one hand on his head while holding the other over his thigh.
Keeping his eyes on Sanders, he says, “Baby, are you okay to walk by yourself?” He sounds like an agent, his voice is sharp and commanding.
“Yes, I can get my crutches from the living room.”
“Good girl. Do you think you can walk to the big house by yourself to get Mason and Jax? And then stay there with your dad.”
I look at Sanders as I nod. “Yeah, I can do that.”
He grabs my nape and crashes his lips to mine, his eyes still on Sanders. His voice softens, and he briefly looks over my face. “Please be careful and take your time so you don’t fall. Okay?”
Nodding, I throw my arms around his shoulders and hug him to me, his arm tightens around my waist. Letting him go, I hobble to the living room and get my crutches from where we left them last night and go to the front door.
As I step onto the porch, I hear Rhys telling Sanders to get on his stomach.
The wind blows loose strands of my hair across my face, and thunder rumbles overhead again.
As I slowly move down the steps, lightning lights up the yard, and I slowly walk the little path I’ve walked in every type of weather toward the house.
When I get around the corner of the garden, large raindrops start to patter around me, bouncing off the large leaves of all the different vegetables in the space next to me, and spatter on my head and shoulders.
Another bolt of lightning flashes, and I see a figure standing on the path in front of me. He’s not someone I know.
And he’s holding a gun.
He’s an older man with thinning hair, and he’s looking at me like I’m a bug to be squashed.
He steps closer to me. “Do you have any idea how much fucking trouble you’ve been?” His angry voice sounds familiar, too.
Where have I heard that voice?
“You walked outside that night, and it’s been a domino effect, two years of work ruined.”
The tone of his voice reminds me of something. Oh! The voice of the man that drones on and on during the meetings that Swan listens to.
Oh, my God!
It’s Rhys’ boss!
The house is behind him in the distance, on the other side of the barn. Looking over his shoulder, I wonder if I could somehow get past him… But I can’t run.
Fuck!
Maybe I can stall him while I think of what I can do. “How was I supposed to know some lowlife, wannabe-drug-dealer plants for the FBI were outside playing games?”
“There’s nothing ‘wannabe’ about it, sweetheart, there’s much more money in drugs than there is in an honest living.” He snarls the word sweetheart.
A light coming on in a window at the big house gets my attention. It’s Hallie’s room. Could she hear me from here if I screamed?
“This sounds like a you problem, it has nothing to do with me.” The rain is plastering my hair to my head, and I pretend to wipe it off my face to look around and see where I am next to the garden. Tall tomato plants are next to me, and on the other side of them are the tall walls of beans.
Another clap of thunder and immediate lightning, and the rain picks up, the big drops getting harder.
He raises his voice. “Do you know what an agent of twenty-five years gets when they retire?” He doesn’t wait for me to respond. “A fucking plaque and just enough to live on for the rest of my life. After a lifetime of putting my life on the line.”
My eyes flick to the house again, the light is still on. “Sounds like you had twenty-five years to plan, but you were too stupid to…”
I swing my crutch at his arm, hitting the gun. It goes off, and a buzzing sound flies past my head as I scream as loud as I can. White-hot pain flashes down one side of my head and neck.
“Goddamn it.” He barks, but I don’t wait to see if he’s dropped the gun.
Dropping my other crutch, I fall to my knees and crawl into the maze of tall tomato cages, zig-zagging through them toward the thick walls of bean vines. The rain is hitting my back, making Rhys’ t-shirt stick to my skin, and my hair is plastered to my face.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Mud squishes between my fingers, and my knees keep slipping in the thick soil, my scrape from the other day stinging in the grit of it, but I’m not stopping for anything. Once I get in between two tall rows of beans, I stop and see if I can hear anything besides the rain pouring onto the ground.
Warmth is blending with the rain running down the side of my head, and pain is throbbing over my ear. Gently, I slide my finger into my hair and feel raw skin. Is this what they call ‘just a scratch’? Because it fucking hurts.
Trying to control my breathing and the panic, fear, and anger coursing through me, I take a few deep breaths. Surely they heard the shot, right?
“Kinley!” I hear Rhys’ voice booming over the rain, and then I hear Mason shouting my name seconds later.
I want to yell to let them know where I am, but I don’t dare move or make any sound. I fold over onto my legs into a fetal position and stay as still as possible to wait for them to find me.
“Stop right there!” I hear Mason yell.
“I’m FBI, I followed Sanders here.” The asshole who just shot me yells at Mason.
The rain is slacking off, and I can hear Mason and Jax talking low. Flashlight beams are moving around the outside of the garden, but I’m afraid that asshole will turn on me if I expose myself.
“Dunn? What are you doing here?” Rhys is on the other side of the garden, but I can hear the suspicion in his voice.
“Kinley!” It’s Jax’s voice this time.
Without moving, I yell back, “I’m here. He shot at me, he’s a dicktwat traitor!”
“I didn’t know who she was, I thought she was Sanders.” Dunn immediately yells.
My head is burning, and I don’t think crouching down like this is helping the bleeding. Lainey Rai fell out of a tree once and cracked her head open, it bled like a stuck pig. I don’t think I’ve seen so much blood. Gray told me that head wounds bleed the worst, even if they aren’t that bad.
Lifting my head, I yell, “He knew it was me.”
“Kinley, come out, baby.” Rhys shouts.
“No, not until you take his gun away.” The burning and aching are throbbing in a constant wave around my head and shoulders, making my ears ring.
“Drop the gun and put your hands up.” This time it’s Mason who is shouting.
“This is a misunderstanding, I thought she was someone else,” Dunn yells back.
“Drop the fucking gun or I will put a bullet between your goddamn eyes.” Mason orders. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him use that tone before.
I can see a flashlight beam, lighting up the ground, through the wall of leaves and moving around between the tomato cages, but I don’t want to give away my location yet.
“Mason, wait, we need to find out what’s going on,” Rhys calls to him.
The flashlight shines on me, and I see a pair of combat boots on the ground a few yards from me. The light moves to the side, and Jax crouches in front of me. “Kinley.” His soft accent is the best thing I’ve heard all night.
A huge breath that has been lodged in my chest rushes out, and I crawl to him. “Jax, he’s one of the drug guys, he told me so. He tried to shoot me.”
He shines the light low on my face and looks at the blood all over the side of my head. I can’t see his eyes, but his jaw turns to stone and his muscle ticks. “Mason.” He doesn’t yell, but the anger in his voice travels over the sound of the light rain.
“Did you find her?”
“Yes, he grazed her. Keep him subdued.” Jax holds out his hands, and I take them so he can help me stand.
“Kinley! Tell me you’re alright.” Rhys bellows, anger and fear laced into his tone.
“I’m okay.” Jax wraps his arm around my waist and helps me hop to the end of the row of beans. Dunn is standing across from me with his hands up. Mason is in front of him with his flashlight and gun pointed at him, and Rhys is on his backside with his gun pointed at him.
The next few seconds are a blur. Dunn turns, and Jax’s arm becomes a vice around my ribs as he is turning me to put himself between us. Almost immediately, I hear a gunshot and a body slumps to the ground.