Page 21 of Cole: Bloodlines

“Call them off?” Gabe frowned. “I didn’t set anyone on us.”

“But you know who it is, don’t you?”

Of course, he knew. Clint and Cochise would never let anyone take Gabe without knowing where he was going.

Roland offered his phone to Gabe. “Make the call and tell them to drop the tail.”

Gabe looked at him for a moment, then grabbed the cell and dialed Clint. Suspicion tinged the cowboy’s voice as he answered the unknown number. “It’s Gabriel,” Gabe said quietly into the phone. “I know you’re following us. But you need to stop. If the madman finds out we were followed, it could cause him to back out of the deal and not release Abel and the kids.” He listened as Clint voiced his resistance to letting Gabe slip away into the night to be handed over to a serial killer with no way to find him. Gabe wasn’t thrilled about it either. But if it meant risking even more danger for Abel and the kids, he was willing to take that chance. “You have to,” Gabe murmured. “We can’t risk harmcoming to Abel and the kids.” He sighed and sniffed. “I love you guys.”

When the call ended, Gabe handed the phone back to the deputy, feeling sick to his stomach. He knew how the‘I love you’sounded to Clint—like agoodbye—and that wouldn’t sit well with the cowboy.

“It’s for the best,” Roland said, tucking the phone away.

“Easy for you to say,” Gabe muttered. “You’re not the one getting handed over to a fucking serial killer.”

“You agreed to this.”

“I didn’t have a choice.”

“There’s always a choice,” the deputy said. “Even if it sucks ass.”

“No,” Gabe mumbled. “Not when my friends are in danger—there is no choice.”

Roland smiled small. “I can see why Henry…Cole…loves you. It won’t be easy on him if you don’t come back. Losingtwoloves to Daniel might just break him for good.”

Gabe frowned. “Two loves?”

The deputy cast him a quick look. “He never told you about Ezra?”

“Who’s Ezra?”

“His first true love. I’ve never seen a boy so in love as Henry at thirteen.”

Gabe looked forward. “He never mentioned Ezra,” he murmured.

“I guess I’m not surprised,” Roland said. “He lost him in a bad way, and it probably hurt too much to think about him. And as he said, he didn’t want to be Henry Pruett anymore when he ran away. And Ezra was a big part of Henry.”

Knowing the psycho fuck had already stolen one love from Cole somehow made this situation even worse.

“Does it bother you that he didn’t tell you about Ezra?” Roland asked. “I get the impression you’re used to him telling you everything.”

He tells me everything.

Gabe flinched inwardly as something in his mind shifted and a memory flashed through his head.

“This doesn’t make sense. Cole doesn’t do things like this.”

“Has he been acting at all off lately? Maybe something’s been troubling him that he didn’t tell you about.”

“He tells me everything,”

Gabe shot a sidelong glance at the deputy as his memories unfurled.

“What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t. But it’s Mark.”

“Have you been working here at the club since it opened?”