Page 34

Time for an update. Call me.

Caleb was napping in his carrier, his little face peaceful in sleep. My heart clenched as I looked at him—so perfect, so innocent, so blissfully unaware of the forces that threatened to tear his small world apart. He looked so much like Lachlan when he slept, the same long eyelashes that would probably make women jealous when he got older.

I could wake him, put him in the stroller, take him for a walk around the neighborhood. Lachlan wouldn’t question it—I’d been taking Caleb out every day that the weather was nice, establishing a pattern of normal new-mother behavior. What Lachlan didn’t know was that each walk had also been practice for this moment, rehearsal for when I’d need to step outside his protection to face the nightmare that still controlled my life.

“Come on, baby boy,” I whispered as I gently transferred Caleb to his stroller. He stirred but didn’t wake, his tiny fist curling against his cheek in a gesture that made my heart ache with love and longing. At least he was safe. At least I could keep him close, could protect him from Ray. It wasn’t enough, but it was something.

The October air was crisp with the promise of winter, and I pulled Lachlan’s jacket tighter around myself as I pushed the stroller down his quiet street. The coat still smelled like him—pine and soap and something indefinably masculine that made me feel safer just wearing it. But the safety was an illusion, a comfort I couldn’t afford to believe in.

I walked three blocks before stopping at a small park with empty playground equipment and bare trees stripped of their leaves. Far enough that if someone told Lachlan they saw us, it would make sense—a new mother taking her baby for some fresh air, nothing more sinister than that.

My hands were steady as I dialed the number I’d memorized years ago. The phone rang twice before Ray’s gravelly voice filled my ear, and I was transported back to childhood, to all the times I’d heard that voice through thin walls, promising violence to anyone who crossed him.

“Piper.”

“I got your message.”

“About fucking time. You’ve been radio silent for a week.”

I closed my eyes, steeling myself for what was coming. The familiar dance of submission and survival I’d learned at his knee, perfected through years of fear and desperation. “I told you I needed time to establish myself here. To gain Lachlan’s trust.”

“Trust.” Ray’s laugh was harsh, bitter, devoid of any warmth or humor. “You always were naive, sweetheart. Men like Calloway don’t trust women like you. He’ll use you, and when he’s done, he’ll throw you away like garbage.”

Given the circumstances, I wouldn’t be able to blame Lachlan if he did toss me out like trash. I was fooling myself if I thought someone like him could ever really care about someone like me.

“What do you want to know, Ray? I don’t have a lot of time.”

“Everything. What’s he working on? Is he onto me at all? Gotten word about the guns or drugs I’m moving through the area? I need details. Real information. That was our deal.”

I pushed the stroller gently back and forth, the motion automatic, soothing. Caleb made a soft sound in his sleep, and I reached down to adjust his blanket, buying myself a few seconds to think. “I don’t know what’s going on. We don’t talk about his work.”

“Then start talking about it.”

“I can’t just?—”

“You can and you will.” Ray’s voice dropped to the dangerous quiet that had terrified me as a child, the tone that meant someone was about to get hurt and it was probably going to be me. “You’re living in his house, sleeping under his roof, playing happy family with his kid. Find a way to get the information I need.”

“I haven’t been able to learn anything useful. Lachlan keeps his work at work.”

“Then get closer. Make him trust you. Make him want to share. You managed to seduce him once—do it again.”

The casual cruelty in his voice made me want to vomit. The night with Lachlan had been the most beautiful experience of my life, a moment of genuine connection and tenderness in a world that had shown me precious little of either. And Ray wanted to turn it into just another con, another manipulation in his endless arsenal of weapons.

“I’m trying, but?—”

“Try harder. You know what will happen if you don’t give me what I need. Don’t put me in that position, Piper.”

My free hand moved instinctively to my chest, to the place where my heart was breaking into smaller and smaller pieces. Yes, I knew what would happen. And no matter what, I couldn’t allow it.

“Please.” The word came out as a whisper, broken and desperate. “Let me see her. I need to know she’s okay.”

“She’s fine. Your mother?—”

“I need proof,” I cut him off, hating how small my voice sounded, how broken. “I need to know you’re not lying.”

“You’ll get proof when you give me what I want. Until then, you follow orders and keep your mouth shut. She’s comfortable, she’s fed, she’s safe. It will stay that way as long as you do what you’re told.”

The words were meant to be reassuring, but they felt like knives sliding between my ribs. Comfortable wasn’t the same as happy. Fed wasn’t the same as loved. Safe wasn’t the same as free. And all of it depended on my continued compliance, my willingness to betray the man who’d shown me more kindness in a week than I’d received in years.