Page 14 of Caution to the Wind

Looking back, that was the start of it for me.

Falling in love with him.

Ruining his life.

They would become one and the same, but right then, it was pure and simple.

I loved him the way a child loved a superhero.

As my mind raced through the horrors of Kate’s death, I felt an overwhelming panic that I’d ever have to leave this room and these people. My hand tightened so fiercely in Cleo’s that she protested in her sleep. I reached out to touch Henning’s overlong, wavy hair, curling a piece around my finger so I could anchor myself with both of them, but it was enough to wake him up.

One turquoise eye, bloodshot and heavy-lidded, opened to stare at me.

“Hey, Rocky,” he muttered, hand flexing on my shin.

“Hey, Henning.”

“How’re you feelin’? Let me call for the doctor.”

“No!” I whisper-shouted, wincing as my ribs protested. “In a minute, okay?”

Henning straightened slowly, so I had time to disentangle my hand from his hair, but he compensated me by reaching out to give it a squeeze. “We aren’t goin’ anywhere ’til your parents get here, yeah?”

I nodded. Dad and Ma were in Toronto for a conference on oil and gas, which explained why they were taking so long to return. I’d been meant to stay the weekend with the Axelsens.

“She’s gone, isn’t she?”

Henning’s face spasmed with hurt so profound he looked eighty years old instead of twenty-eight. “Yeah, Rocky, she’s gone.”

“Why did those people do that to her?” The words were chewed up in the garburator of my swollen throat.

His lips thinned. “I have no clue. The police don’t seem to have any leads right now either.”

“Could it have been one of those bad guys from before?” I asked hesitantly.

I knew, even though I shouldn’t have, that Kate had been a prostitute when she met Henning. She had loads of scars on her beautiful body from her old pimp, Jimmie Page, and the jerks he sent to her as clients.

“Maybe,” he conceded, but his jaw was hard-edged as a knife, and he didn’t seem like he wanted to speak any more about it. “I’m sorry you got hurt.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t save her,” I told him baldly, somehow too sad to even cry.

His head went limp on his neck like it was suddenly impossible to carry the weight of his thoughts. “Yeah,” he said, rough as a cough. “Yeah, I’m sorry I couldn’t save either of ya.”

“You saved me,” I argued vehemently. “I think I could have died if you didn’t come soon. How did you find us?”

“Was keepin’ an eye on Cleo when I noticed you weren’t with her crew anymore. I’d met up with some buddies, and one of them stayed with them while the two of us searched for you.” He paused, eyes shuttering. “Heard you scream from the mouth of that House of Horrors and knew in my bones it was you.”

Silence for a long moment as we both considered how lucky I’d been and howunluckyKate had been that Henning hadn’t found us just a few minutes earlier.

“How bad is it?” I asked, jerking my chin at my casted arm and leg.

“Broken arm, broken foot, a severe concussion, a few broken ribs, shattered nose, and a ruptured spleen,” he catalogued for me. “You’ve got a broken tooth the dentist will have to fix for you when you’re feelin’ better, too.”

“Not so bad,” I murmured, thinking of Kate.

“No,” he agreed slowly, one thick finger tracing the line of my cast. “You can get your friends to sign this.”

My laugh was a hollow bark. “What friends?”