Page 24 of Capture (Primal #3)

G unner,” I mouthed with my eyes closed as a warm body next to me wriggled.

I bolted upright when I thought someone was in my room. I patted for Gunner to wake him, but his side of the bed was cold. And it occurred to me that I was in the room at the club, and Gunner was somewhere else.

I stared at the ceiling in the twilight, barely making out the grooves in the plasterboard and the floral wallpaper as I listened for the slightest of sounds.

Sometimes, underneath the sex noises and footsteps along the floorboards, I’d hear jazz music playing, like the music they played in the bar when girls danced.

Upbeat, fun music that made the members smile and buy more liquor, and they let their guard down, they’d spin the roulette wheel and spend or lose more money than they intended.

“Where are you, Gunner?” I whispered into the night.

No reply. “I hope you’re okay and not hurt.

Someone will come for you soon. Mikael and Ronan won’t let you down.

Of course, they won’t because you’re family.

They’d never abandon you, and even if it took months, they’d move oceans and destroy to find you.

” I swallowed. “That’s why I want to stay, Gunner.

I want to stay with you three and work my butt off to build your trust in me.

I promise, Gunner, I’ll never let you down, ever.

Not anymore, Gunner. I will never let any of you down, including Mikael, who…

well, is a bit intense, isn’t he. He needs to take a chill pill, and then maybe we could get along; he could even hire me to work here.

The four of us together can make it the best club in the country.

That’s my objective now. To make Savile, the best club in the entire country. ”

Silence.

“But where are you, Gunner?” I hissed. “Do Mikael and Ronan know where you are? I know it sounds insane, but if you can hear me, whisper my name in the dark?”

Silence.

“Okay, maybe that’s harder to do, and maybe you’re sleeping and can’t hear me talking to you telepathically. Yes, I know I could be going insane, Gunner, because I’m talking to myself, but thinking of you, hoping you can hear me. Let’s try something else. If you hear me, tap on the wall.”

Silence.

“Go on, Gunner.” I cupped my mouth and whispered-shouted, “Tap on the wall.”

Silence.

I closed my eyes again, sinking back into the mattress to sleep, only to snap my eyes back open when I heard a tap on the wall opposite. My body bolted upright and peered into the dark to see if someone was there.

“Oh my god, I am losing my mind,” I whispered out loud. I so desperately wanted Gunner to contact me that I imagined him tapping on the wall.

Was this the first sign of madness? Or maybe the room was creaking. Yes, that’s it. It is an old building made of wood, so naturally, the natural materials move and creak with changes in temperature and moisture.

The tapping repeated, and I sat up again and stared at the wall as if Gunner was going to appear like a ghost and take me in his arms. No movement, so I climbed out of bed and tiptoed to the wall and pressed my ear against the wallpaper. Then tapped to see if he’d return my fake Morse code.

When he did, I propelled backwards in fright, slamming into the edge of the bed and falling onto the mattress.

“Gunner?” I whispered as I rolled off the bed, then stepped toward the wall again. I pressed my ear against the wall, wondering if he was trapped inside, creating an entire scenario in my head that he had been hiding in the foundations of the club the whole time.

“What are you doing, Gunner?” I raised my voice because there was unlikely to be anyone here to hear me talking to myself, even though I wasn’t talking to myself, if Gunner were here.

“No,” a muffled male voice replied. “Gunner is not here.”

“Ronan?” I exclaimed as my heart fluttered, knowing that he was only a wall away, but disappointed that Gunner wasn’t here.

The lock clicked, and the door opened as his impressive figure moved in the dark, bringing with him a cloud of cologne and body heat. “How long have you been out there?”

“I’ve come and gone and maybe been here for a couple of hours, guarding the room,” his smooth voice filled the room and cocooned my body.

“It must be uncomfortable out there, so why don’t you come in when you have to guard me instead of sitting out there in the hallway?” I suggested.

I caught the movement of his shoulders shrugging as a warm hand took my hand in his, and I crumbled under his touch.

There were moments like this where I felt guilty for being so weak to their touches, but that’s what the Kaisers and Ronan did to me.

Ronan and I were outsiders, not blood-related, so we had a connection, if only I could convince him that I was worth keeping.

“I guess, I interpret standing guard to mean outside the prison cell,” he replied as I wrapped my arms around his solid body, breathing in his scent. “We’re not going to forget Gunner,” he promised.

“I know you’d never do that in a million years, but he was part of my life too…oh heck, have you told Sylvie yet?” I panicked, imagining how she’d react to her only son being stolen by the enemy or cops.

He scoffed. “No way, she’d kill us.” He hesitated for a few seconds as his hand ran along my spine in a soothing, comforting way, rather than sexual. “Mikky has to call her about something else, so he’ll have to lie when she asks how her son is.”

I swallowed over a lump in my throat as the guilt for what I had done to this family may never leave me.

First, her husband was murdered in cold blood, then her nephew was wrongly arrested for his murder.

Yeah, I definitely fucked up, and the only way they’d forgive me was to blame my young, stupid age and being strong-armed by Bitchtective.

“Does she ever ask about me?” I rationalized, unsure if I wanted to hear his reply. “Sylvie, I mean, does she ever ask about me?”

He made a strange hissing noise, like a balloon letting out air, possibly debilitating as to how to answer my question.

“We haven’t told her that you’re with us.

She doesn’t know that we know of your whereabouts and that you’ve been under our noses the entire time.

We haven’t told her anything. Not even that you were under the witness protection program with a new persona. Yeah, we haven’t told her anything.”

“Did Mikael order you not to say anything?” I asked him as he broke our embrace, and cool air brushed over my cheeks.

“Go back to bed,” he ordered, gently grasping my wrist and leading me to the bedside.

“Will you stay for a while? Please?” I pleaded quietly.

“If you want me to,” he stated. “And yes, it was Mikky who told us to keep you a secret.”

“Why?” I kneeled on the mattress and crawled to the far side of the bed so that he could slip in beside me.

“Because the wrath of Sylvie was far worse than Lars and Mikky combined?” he said it lightheartedly in a joking sort of way, but I knew it wasn’t really a joke; otherwise, they would’ve told her.

“What do you think she’d do to me if she found out I was working in the club?” I asked as I snuggled down under the blankets.

He snorted in amusement, then swore under his breath. “I wouldn’t want to think about it.”

“Do you mean she might have me knocked off?” I kept pushing to see what he’d say. I was fully aware that they’re a crime family and that she’d have access to the same hitmen as Lars would.

“No comment,” he stated abruptly, and I cracked up laughing as his arms wrapped around my body and he nestled his chin into the curve of my neck. It was a grave matter, and I shouldn’t laugh, but with all the heavy drama that has been going on lately, it’s nice to see the funny side.

He didn’t seem in the mood for sex, which was good, because I was a little depleted from bonking his boss in the shower. Instead, he held me, and in the safety and warmth of his embrace, my eyes closed. As I listened to his breathing, he seemed to fall into a slumber.

Several moments passed where I lay still, pretending to be asleep, but my head was too busy with thoughts of Gunner, schooling that I was missing, Lars, the cops, and everything else.

“Why did you think I was Gunner?” Ronan questioned, which made me jump because I thought he was asleep. I bit my lip trying to come up with an explanation so I didn’t seem mad and delusional.

He continued as I lay still, “I heard you talking to Gunner. Perhaps you were half-asleep, sleepwalking, or something else. I heard what you said about how you are sorry and you’d do whatever it takes to make it up to us.”

Ronan exhaled and continued in a slur as if he was groggy and half-asleep, barely knowing what he was saying, “Annika? You’re asleep?”

No, I was wide awake, curious to hear what he was going to say next. He mumbled some more, moved his arm to scratch his face, feet grazed against mine, then fell still, followed by another exhale.

I thought he was done chatting, and I expected a light snore to fill the air, indicating that he was asleep. Then, he startled, which made me jump, but my racing heart was quickly soothed by a hand stroking my hair.

“I believe you,” he said, and I wondered what he was talking about.

“I believe you, Annika. When you said that you’d do anything to earn our trust, I believed you.

When you said you were sorry, I believed you.

” He paused and wriggled in the sheets. “When you said that you want to be part of the business and part of the Kaiser family, I believed you.”

Something wet struck my cheek, and I realized that I was crying.

Pent-up emotions and the weight of guilt that I carried over the last three years started pouring down my face.

This was only the beginning, as I was well aware that I had a lot of work to do to convince Mikael, especially, not to mention Sylvie.

I’d work my butt off, work overtime for free, I’d let them check my phone so they knew I wasn’t secretly messaging the police. Whatever they asked of me, I’d do.

However, this was a significant first step because, despite everything else, Ronan believed in me.