Page 20 of Mastered by Them (Rose and Dagger #2)

Troy

O ne of the Ironwood bodyguards keeps hold of Amber, and the other gestures me out of the room. Two more arrive soon after to tend to Dan. He’s moaning and carrying on, but either he’s pretending or he’s a bigger wimp than I thought. I barely hit him.

I’m glad I gave Ironwood a heads-up that shit might go down tonight. They won’t work for the Laytons, but they came in for Amber. They didn’t realize she’s just as much of a criminal as the Layton family.

When we reach the ballroom, the entire space has been cleared. Gone are the caterers, the guests, the musicians, everyone. The party’s dead. Cause of death? Gunshot wound.

Some uniformed police officers pass us, going into the hall I just came from. They emerge moments later, Amber in their custody.

Amber doesn’t scream, doesn’t fight. She doesn’t make a fucking sound. Her lips are drawn down in an angry curve, her eyes lowered.

We walk through the ballroom and out of the hotel.

“Troy!” Dani ignores the bodyguards and police officers and barrels straight into me.

Something cracks—my heart, I think. All of the emotion I’ve bottled up brims to the surface. I wrap my arms around her and breathe deeply. “Dani.”

“I’m so sorry—Troy, I should’ve listened?—”

“Excuse us, we need to get a statement.” A cop elbows his way over.

Dani tries to keep her arms around my waist, but Edmund appears.

“I’ve already given my statement.” Edmund touches her shoulder. “Danica, we’ll go home and wait for Troy. Because Troy, you’re coming home after this, right?”

I look around at the cops, bodyguards, EMTs, and hotel staff bustling around. “Yeah. If they let me.”

“They will.” Dani leans back so she can stare into my eyes. Fuck, I missed her. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Not now, and…and not before.”

Well, I did some things wrong. But not as much as she was led to believe by those reports.

“I’ll send Mink to you, Troy.” Edmund’s voice is firm and he touches Dani’s shoulder again. He gives me a meaningful look. “You still work for the Laytons. Far as I’m concerned, you never stopped.”

Mink is the family lawyer, and she’s gotten me out of all kinds of trouble—trouble I’ve done, and trouble I didn’t do.

I hate letting Dani go, but I have to. Leaning forward, I press a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll be home soon.”

* * *

Edmund

A little before midnight, Troy texted that he was still waiting to give a statement at the police station. He’s used to that shit, and Mink was with him, so I’m not worried.

Danica and I went to bed—separate rooms, because she’s insisting on sleeping on her own.

But sometime after falling asleep, I wake up.

She hasn’t made a sound, so I’m not sure what alerted me. But I’m glad I woke, because Danica stands at the side of my bed. Her silver-gray camisole and sleep shorts look soft. I have to flex my fists to keep from reaching out to touch her.

“Hey, angel.” I sit up. “You okay?”

“Another bad dream.” Her voice is hoarse from sleep—or screaming. Did she scream and I didn’t hear her?

I flip the sheet off me and scoot over. “Climb on in, angel.”

She slides onto the mattress next to me, her smooth legs brushing against mine. I groan and tug her closer, pressing my hand to her lower back. Something about her makes me feel possessive. I don’t know what it is, but I’m tired of fighting the impulse.

When she’s lying half on top of me, I ask, “Do you want to talk about your nightmare?”

“It’s the same as usual. I’m sinking and I can’t breathe. It’s like the mud is trying to pull me in. Quicksand or something.” She shudders and presses closer. “I don’t want to think about it anymore.”

I wonder if I should push her to talk about it.

If she keeps having these nightmares, maybe her subconscious is trying to tell her something, I don’t know.

My mother used to have a “dream therapist”—I think she was having an affair with him, actually—and she would go on and on about how our minds are trying to tell us things through our dreams.

“All right.” I kiss the top of her head. Her hair is wavy from the updo she wore to the party and I smooth it with my free hand. Everything about this girl is soft…except her steely resolve.

I’m falling for her. No, I’ve already fallen. I feel too goddamn much, and I’m feeling it all for Danica. My princess, my angel.

* * *

Danica

I wake up in Edmund’s bed. His spot is empty beside me, but warm. He must have gotten up recently.

My nightmares are blurry horrors, washed away first by his comfort, then by the morning light. Like a true “daddy,” he chased away the monsters.

Low voices sound from the other room. Troy’s home! I sit up and swing myself out of bed. I didn’t have a chance for a real apology last night. It was rushed, nothing like the long speech I’d rehearsed, the groveling I was prepared to do.

I hurry into the living room, not bothering to dress. I want to see that man right fucking now.

But he isn’t here. The voices came from newscasters on the television.

“Hey.” Edmund gives me a smile. “Coffee’s in the kitchen. Want me to pour you a cup?”

“Not yet…where’s Troy?”

Edmund winces. “The flash drive he had…our attorney wanted to go over it with him, see if there’s anything that can be used in a trial.”

“So he’s still not home?”

“He came home, then he had to take off again. He sneaked into my room to give you a kiss, though. He didn’t want to wake you up.”

I wish he’d woken me. I wish a lot of things, though—my biggest wish is that I’d never made him leave.

“Hey.” Edmund stands and comes over to hold me. “He’ll be home again soon, and you can go through your whole apology speech with him then.”

I lean into Edmund’s embrace. I could get used to this—his attention, his care.

The news continues to play behind him. The reporters segue into something about the human remains found at the north side of Danish Lake.

“Oh, Elias is going to be all over this.” I roll my eyes and turn Edmund so he can see the screen. “Unless he already knows. He probably does. I made a bet with Wallace that Elias sleeps with a police scanner. I haven’t proven it yet, though.”

The woman on the television screen adopts an expression of sympathy, balanced with professionalism. “The remains have been identified as belonging to Britney Gardner, an SEU student who disappeared fifteen years ago?—”

Wait a minute. I grab Edmund’s arm. “I know that name. Britney Gardner.”

“Yeah. She disappeared while I was in college. It was all over the news. But you must’ve been…what…really young.” He grins. “I didn’t realize I was a cradle-robber.”

“Don’t be gross.” I give him a gentle shove and turn my attention back to the TV. “I vaguely remember the story.”

Two images come to my mind. Britney’s beautiful face on the news. Her parents clutching each other at a press conference, begging for information about her disappearance.

The rest of the details are fuzzy. Too much time has passed.

But the name, the revelation, the buzz about her death—it feels important. It feels big .

I have to look this up. I grab my phone at the same time the newscaster starts talking again. “…She disappeared from Danish Lake Summer Camp, where she’d been a counselor. Searches were conducted?—”

“Oh.” I sit down, hard. My phone tumbles to the rug in front of me. New images are flashing through my mind. Fresh ones. Or at least, they feel fresh, because I just dreamed them.

“Danica?” Edmund tugs at my hand. “Are you okay?”

Sinking into the water. Mud filling my mouth, nose, ears. Trying to get up but there’s a heavy weight pressing on me.

I almost drowned.

And I think Britney did drown.

My nightmares aren’t nightmares at all.

They’re memories.

* * *

Thank you for reading Mastered by Them ! The third book in the series, Treasured by Them , continues the steam and suspense.