Page 50 of Ace (The Deuces Wild #4)

Gran Mere’s final words flowed back into Savannah’s mind like molasses in summertime, warming her as only her great grandmother’s gentle kindness could.

It felt as if she were actually there in the bedroom with her, whispering again, ‘Let me go, Savannah. Look for the wild rose that grow best deep in the bayou. Watch for the warlock. He holds a black magic in his heart that only you can overcome. You hold the key to bring him down, my dearest. Whatever happens, be fearless and strong. Be the blessing the world needs more than it ever needed me. Hold fast to the rose.’

‘I’m fairly certain RJ is the troll who’s been shadowing me. That’s his style, whisper lies when you’re most vulnerable. But he’s no warlock. Gran Mere used to say he was more of a pipsqueak than a man. He’s smart, but he lacks sight.’

‘And you’re already the blessing the world needs, but who’s the rose?’ Eden asked.

‘I think we all know who,’ Isaiah whispered.

Savannah understood then. ‘Keller. He’s the rose, because…

’ That night in her boat. He’d been relaxed.

Calm. Laid-back but possessed with an other-worldly type of calm.

Out of the corner of her eye, she’d watched how his chest had swelled with every deep breath he’d taken.

How languid his muscles had become. He’d relaxed.

For that singular moment in his hectic FBI world, he’d been utterly at peace and serene and—home.

Keller not only enjoyed the unique tranquility of life in the bayou, he drew power from it. It was his safe place.

And her Secret Agent Man talked with trees. The clues had been there all this time. Keller Boniface was the wild rose that grew best deep in the bayou. She couldn’t speak it. Yet her heart screamed it. Keller. I love Keller and I’ll die for him, too.

‘Well, okay then,’ Eden said brightly. ‘Now, let’s focus on Tuck getting to Keller in time, then, you bet, Isaiah and I will hunt this troll down for you and we’ll nail his ass.’

Obviously, she and Isaiah had heard everything, even her memories, but Savannah didn’t care.

Keller already knew she loved him. A sob choked out of her throat.

It hurt knowing she’d done nothing to deserve these federal agents care and understanding, yet here they were, Keller’s friends, ready to die for—

‘Your friends,’ Isaiah corrected.

‘You don’t have to deserve love to receive it,’ Eden murmured confidentially. ‘I think you already know that.’

‘I do.’ Because I love Keller despite the wall he’s built to keep me out.

‘Come on now,’ Isaiah soothed. ‘Be fearless and strong like your Gran Mere said you—’

‘Will you guys knock it off?’ Tucker bellowed. ‘I’ve got him, Savannah. I’ve got Kell. He’s cold and he’s weak, but this man’s too damned proud and too tough to die, so stop whining. He’s Army for God’s sake. He’s been through worse crap than this little shitty hole in his chest.’

Savannah winced. She hadn’t been able to tune in on Tucker but she saw him clearly now.

The man was an imposing sight, sitting on the ground like an angry giant, his legs straight out, and Keller’s top half prone across his lap.

Tucker’s hands and fingers moved by rote over the wound in his chest as if he’d doctored other men before.

‘Something else is going on with him, Boss,’ Isaiah cut in. ‘It’s in his gut and lungs. I can hear it.’

‘Copy that,’ Tucker answered. ‘He’s not breathing right.’

Tucker’s face glistened with sweat, and his heartbeat thumped loud in his chest. He and several other FBI agents had run all the way from his SWAT vehicle to where Sand Dollar still stood swaying on unsteady feet.

Keller lay unconscious, his head to the side, his eyes closed and oblivious to his rescue.

‘He’s going to make it,’ Eden whispered encouragingly. ‘Have faith in that man of yours.’

‘I do,’ Savannah replied even as she bit her lip. He was so gray, and there was so much sticky, wet blood on his chest and arm. And that thing Isaiah detected in his chest. She heard it too. Was she too late?

Tucker’s lips were pressed thin with determination.

His coal black eyes glistened while the other agents cornered Sand Dollar.

Savannah never felt more certain that this brash man whom Keller hadn’t liked from the get-go, would die before he let Keller die.

Which only made her sob more. Keller wasn’t the kind of man to love her, only to leave her behind.

It just wasn’t in him. She knew that now.

Eden was right. He would come around. It was Savannah’s job to love him until he did.

‘I got you, buddy,’ Tucker kept saying as real medics wheeled a gurney and a large medical case on wheels over the lumpy Florida grass to where he sat. ‘Trust me, Kell. You belong here. The team needs you. I need you, and I got you.’

‘And I need you,’ Savannah breathed to the man she loved with her whole heart. ‘I need you so much, Keller. Please don’t leave me.’

‘He ain’t going nowhere,’ Tucker growled deep in his throat as both young medics knelt at his side, instantly triaging Keller’s condition, talking into the two-way radios pinned to their shoulders.

Barking orders. Initiating IVs. Saline solution.

An antibiotic. The FBI SWAT helicopter hovered overhead, spotlighting the scene.

Poor tranquilized Sand Dollar moved closer to where Tucker still held onto Keller.

The goofy horse seemed just as out of it as Keller.

“Sir, excuse me,” one medic said to Tucker, “but we’ve got him now. You can let go.”

“You’d better take damned good care of my agent,” Tucker growled, his dark eyes lethal, “or so help me—"

‘Tuck, let him go,’ Isaiah interjected. ‘These guys are the real deal. They’re honest medics. You’re in their way, Boss. Let them do their job.’

Swallowing hard, his rigid throat muscles contracting, Tucker muttered to Keller, “I’ll be right behind you, Kell. All the way. Don’t do anything stupid.”

‘I have got to get to Florida,’ Savannah murmured as the medics wheeled Keller to the waiting ambulance.

‘Count on it,’ Isaiah said easily. ‘There’s a jet on standby at Louis Armstrong National Airport. Call a cab. It can leave as soon as you arrive.’

‘But I have no money. ’

‘But I do. Stop worrying. It’s my jet. Tell the cabbie to call me,’ Isaiah rattled off a phone number , ‘and I’ll make it worth his trouble.’

‘But I have two dogs with me, and appointments I have to keep tomorrow, and—’

‘Savannah, stop with the buts,’ Eden murmured.

‘It’s Isaiah’s private plane. Bring the dogs.

And all those appointments can wait. Keller can’t.

People will understand. We’ve got your six, sister.

Now call a cab, tell them you’ll be transporting two well-behaved dogs with you, and get your butt on that plane. ’

‘Okay, I will.’ Savannah nodded though she knew no one could see her. It felt profoundly different having this team of psychic warriors at her back. Maybe that job offer Isaiah wanted to talk to her about wasn’t such a far-fetched idea. ‘Director Chase, can you hear me?’

A curt ‘ What now?’ came back to her.

‘When you get to the hospital, please tell Keller that I… I love him, and I don’t care if me and all my dogs have to move to Washington, DC, I’ll do anything to be with him.’

The ornery man growled, ‘Tell him yourself. He’s not going anywhere.’

She was beginning to love this crazy psychic Deuces Wild team. Even Tucker Chase.