Page 55 of Shattered Promise (Avalon Falls #4)

MASON

The world collapses into a pinpoint, and I can’t breathe.

My girl is pregnant.

She’s alone out there, in a storm, probably scared—after I told her she didn’t belong to us. That Theo wasn’t hers.

I’m such a fucking asshole.

I lunge for my phone and dial her number, but it goes straight to voicemail.

A cold sweat breaks out beneath my shirt. I try again and still nothing. This time, I leave a message, voice ragged.

“Baby, it’s me. Please call when you get this. Please come back.”

But even as I hang up, I know I’m not waiting around.

Forty minutes later, I’m pounding on Beau’s front door like it owes me answers.

Rain needles down in hard, slanted sheets. Thunder booms low and heavy. I shift Theo higher against my chest, hunching over him, keeping his head covered as I bang again.

The porch light flips on. The door swings open.

“Mase?” Beau blinks at me, confused. His eyes drop to Theo before flicking back to my face. Whatever he sees there has his smile falling from his face like it was never there. “Jesus. Come inside.”

Inside, the house is bright and close and smells like warm bread and Eloise’s vanilla candle, same as always.

For a split second, it could be a normal night.

But I don’t let go of Theo, not even to strip off my jacket.

My fingers are locked, white-knuckled, around the curve of his back, and he clings to my collar, the way he does when he’s half-asleep.

Beau stares at me for a beat. Then without a word, he takes my elbow—harder than he means to, I think—and pulls me all the way into the kitchen.

Eloise is at the counter, breaking chunks off of a cinnamon roll. She looks up, startled, when we enter. “Everything okay?”

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. There’s too much to say and none of it will fit.

Beau answers for me, “Not yet. But we’re gonna fix it.” He gestures to the table. “Sit,” he says.

I do. Theo melts into my lap, head heavy on my shoulder. I kiss the top of his hair and look at Eloise. “I need a favor.”

Eloise’s eyes flick back and forth between Theo and me, searching for an injury, accident, some bleeding—something she knows how to fix.

I shake my head once. “He’s fine,” I manage. My voice sounds like it belongs to someone else. “But I need you to watch him for a little bit.”

“Alright. I’ll bring him to the living room. Vivie will be thrilled to help. She’s been trying to weasel her way into a later bedtime anyway.” She crosses the kitchen, gentle and sure, and I surrender my son to her arms.

“Thank you.”

She nods, and Theo stares back at me with wide, tired eyes. Like I haven’t failed him tonight.

“It’s alright, buddy. You’re okay,” I murmur, running my hand over his head.

He lays his head down on Eloise’s shoulder as she wanders out of the kitchen.

“Start talking,” Beau demands.

I take a breath. It’s now or never, and never isn’t an option. Not anymore. Not for me and her. We’re fucking fated, and I won’t let this or anyone—or thing—get in my way again.

“You remember the promise I made you in tenth grade?” I ask, voice shaking. The memory is a splinter in my head, sharp and stupid. But it matters now.

Beau’s brow goes up. “What promise?”

I look him dead in the eye. “About your sisters.”

His face goes stone still. “Jesus, Mase.”

I nod, jaw grinding. “Yeah. That one. You made me swear I’d never so much as think about them.” My hands fist on the table. “I broke it, Beau. I took a sledgehammer to it and shattered that promise into a million fucking pieces, and I don’t regret it.”

“Explain,” he grits out. “Because I need more context.”

I drag my palms over my face, wishing I could peel off my skin and start over.

“I’m in love with Abby,” I say, voice hoarse.

“I think I’ve been in love with her for a long time, man.

But I never crossed that line. Not until a few months ago.

Because I thought that’s what you wanted.

Thought that’s what family meant— never stepping over that line, never fucking up what we had.

But then she came back, and she was different, and so was I, and I tried—fuck, I tried so hard—but I couldn’t do it anymore. ”

The words hang in the air. A slow, stunned silence settles.

For a second, I think Beau might actually hit me. His knuckles are pale where he grips the back of the kitchen chair, eyes gone narrow and dark. The muscle in his jaw ticks.

“Fuck, Mase.” The words are soft, almost gentle, which is somehow way worse than if he’d just started swinging.

I don’t look away. I can’t. “I know. I know what it means. I’ll take the hit if you need to land one. But I need you to listen first. I love your sister. And something’s wrong. She’s gone. I can’t find her anywhere. Have you seen her tonight? Heard from her?”

He stares at me so long I think maybe he’s weighing the chair like a weapon, deciding if it’s worth throwing at my head.

He holds the stare long enough that the silence starts to vibrate, then, all at once, Beau pushes off the chair, circles the table, and yanks me up and into a hug so hard I almost tip backward. My breath whooshes out, not from the impact but from the shock of it.

He squeezes the hell out of me, then pulls back, and lands a punch to my gut. “Fuckin’ idiot,” he says, but there’s humor in his tone.

He pulled his punch, but it’s still hard enough to knock the air from my lungs. I double over, hand braced on the island. “Feel better?” I choke out.

Beau exhales hard. “Not really, but all I’m saying is Peach owes me. I totally called that shit. You and I will square up later, for now, let’s go find my sister.”

He grabs his keys off the island and stalks toward the front door. I’m already in motion, adrenaline burning through the last of my hesitation.

“Where?”

He doesn’t look back. “We need our resident wizard.”

Ten minutes later, we’re inside Graham’s office on the third floor of his apartment next door to Beau’s. It’s more like a command center, with a wall full of curved monitors, each one alive with data, code, or grainy security feeds.

“Start from the beginning,” Graham says, leaning against his desk with his arms folded.

Panic claws at my throat, an invisible countdown ticking away inside my body. “I don’t have time to go over everything again?—”

“Mason fell in love with our sister, said something stupid most likely, she stormed off in a very un-Abby-like way, and now he can’t find her. Since you’re the Almighty Oz, we need you to do your thing and find her,” Beau says like he’s listing things on a grocery list.

“Almighty Oz?” Graham asks, arching his brow.

“That’s all you got from that?” I snap, squeezing my hand into a fist.

Graham pins me with a look. “You want my help or not?”

“Yeah,” I grit out.

“Where was the last place you saw her?” He drops into his chair, fingers flying over the keyboard.

I palm the back of my neck. “Uh, my house. But she was heading to her cabin.”

“She has a cabin ?” Beau cuts in, eyebrows up.

I exhale sharply, worried I’m giving away her secrets. “She inherited it from Nana Jo. It’s not far from my house, it’s how we ran into one another back in the spring.”

Beau slides Graham a pointed look. “Did you know about this cabin?”

Graham doesn’t even blink. “Don’t insult me, brother.”

Beau exhales and shakes his head. “And let me guess, you knew she’s been back for months?”

“Of course I did. I have the whole family under my new location services software.”

Beau curses low under his breath. “One of these days, you’re going to go too far, man.”

But not today, I think.

“What are you waiting for? Track her.” I pace the perimeter of Graham’s office, adrenaline chewing at my nerves.

The place is more server farm than living space—towers humming, blue LEDs casting everything in a kind of deepwater glow.

The rain beats hard against the roof. I can’t stop imagining Abby somewhere out there, cold and alone, maybe hurt, maybe worse.

Graham’s eyes flick over his screens, hands a blur on the keys. He talks mostly to himself, reciting IP addresses and carrier data, a half-muttered litany of numbers. It’s the only thing keeping me from losing my shit.

“She’s not showing up,” he says finally, tilting his monitor toward us.

“No cell signal pings in the last two hours. It’s either off or she’s in a dead zone.

Once I install my program as an app on all of our phones, it won’t matter if we’re in dead zones or our phones are dead, I’ll still be able to track it. ”

“What about her laptop?” Beau asks, snapping his fingers.

I shake my head, my thoughts spinning as my gaze zones out on Graham’s monitor.

“No, it was left on her table in her cabin. Along with all her suitcases and her espresso cans in the fridge. But her coffee mugs, book club paperback, all her toiletries—they were all gone. I just . . . I don’t know where she would go. ”

A thick quiet falls over the command center. Graham’s hands hover above the keyboard, waiting for something to materialize from thin air, but there’s nothing. Just the blue-lit hush of too many monitors and the sound of the storm pressing against the glass.

And I’m helpless.

I’m a grown man, a father, a mechanic with a tool for every problem, and still—there is nothing in my hands but empty air. My fists clench and unclench as I continue to pace the room, watching the world fail to yield a solution.

“She wouldn’t just leave,” I say, voice barely above a whisper. “Not without saying goodbye to Theo.”

“You’re thinking about this wrong. Instead of where she is, let’s think about who she’s with,” Graham says.

Beau and I look at one another and say, “Lansing.”

The name alone makes something sharp twist in my gut. I don’t know if he’s involved or not, but he’s the only person I can think of right now. Almost everyone Abby talks to is in this block of maisonette apartments.

Graham’s already typing. The clack of his keys is fast, methodical, lethal. “Jake Lansing. Abby’s ex-boyfriend. Lives in Maple Grove now, works at Hobbs Inc., drives a Camry. Last pinged location was at the apartments on Highway RAF.”

The road that serves as the border between Rosewood and Avalon Falls.

I’m already moving, but Beau claps a hand on my shoulder, stopping me. “Hey,” he says quietly, “whatever you’re about to do, we’re with you, yeah?”

I nod, barely absorbing the words. My hands shake, and the only thing keeping me from breaking every bone in Lansing’s face is the fact that I need answers more than I need revenge.

We’re down three flights and into Graham’s truck before my pulse even slows. The rain is a waterfall, thunder shaking the world itself. Graham drives, Beau rides shotgun, and I wedge myself into the back.

Beau’s phone pings. He doesn’t look at it. “So what’s the plan?” He’s talking to me, but his eyes are on the road ahead, scanning for threats, for hope, for anything.

“Find her,” I say. “And bring her home.”

It’s been a while since I’ve driven with Graham. I’d forgotten how he handles a car. He doesn’t drive as fast as Beau or I would, but he’s efficient. Taking the fastest route to Highway RAF.

My phone vibrates in my pocket, and I pull it out with my heart in my throat, hoping it’s her.

You’ve been added to the group.

Beau changed the name of the group to Dudes.

Beau: @jasper you busy? We need backup.

Beau: Meet us at the apartments on RAF.

Beau: How tight are you with Rosewood PD?

There’s a pause—long enough to hear the next crack of thunder overhead.

Jasper: What’s going on

Beau: Mason broke a promise I made him give me forever ago and fell in love with my sister.

Beau: So I punched him and forgave him.

Graham lets out a soft huff of laughter under his breath, and I realize that he’s opting to have his car read his texts over the speaker. I must’ve zoned out or he had the volume too low.

Jasper: Well done, Mason.

Me: Thanks?

I scrub a hand over my face. I should care how this looks, how this sounds. But all I can see is Abby’s face when she smiles at Theo like he hung the goddamn moon.

Beau: Now we’re looking for Abby because she dipped. Not even Oz can find her.

Jasper: Who’s at the apartments?

Mason: A dead man.

Beau: Fucking Lansing.

Jasper: Cora wants me to tell you she never liked him.

Jasper: And “fuck that guy”

Jasper: And she’d like this conversation to be in the big group chat so she doesn’t have to relay her messages through me.

Beau: Tell my sister to stop distracting you. Meet us there.

Jasper: I’ll be there in ten.

Jasper: My contact in Rosewood PD can get there in twenty.

Jasper: Don’t let Mason kill anyone. That’s from Cora.

Mason: No promises.

Beau twists around in his seat, watching me. “You good?”

I meet his eyes. “No. But I’m going to be.”

He nods once, sharp and sure. “Then let’s go find her.”

Graham floors it.

Graham’s truck jerks to a stop, tires screeching against wet pavement. I’m out before the engine cuts.

Rain pelts down like nails. Wind slaps my shirt against my skin. But all I see is him .

Jake dead man Lansing.

Pacing the sidewalk underneath the awning with his phone glued to his ear.

I cross the lot fast—don’t even feel my feet hitting the ground. I grab him by the front of his jacket and slam him into the side of the building.

“Where is she?” My voice shreds in my throat. “What the hell did you do to her?”

Jake’s eyes go wide. His phone clatters to the concrete. “Mason—Jesus, I didn’t know it was her, I swear?—”

I slam him again. My forearm presses across his collarbone. He’s shaking now.

“You expect me to believe that?” My jaw is locked so tight I can feel the pressure in my ears. “You’re gonna tell me where she is. Right now.”

Beau’s right behind me, voice low and deadly. “Start talking, Lansing. Fast.”

Jake’s breath hitches. His hands flutter up like he’s surrendering to gravity. “They said she needed help— Lisa and Beth—they’re my mom’s cousin’s kids. We grew up together, kind of. And they didn’t say it was Abby. I thought it was just a friend, someone trying to get away?—”

“Where.” I shove him back again, tighter this time. I’m seconds from snapping. “Where the fuck is she?”

Jake’s gaze skitters to the side. “Apartment seven,” he whispers. “Top floor.”

I release him.

He slumps against the wall, chest heaving. I don’t wait to see if he stands.

I’m already running.

The stairs blur under my boots, wet soles slipping on the edges, Beau right behind me. We take the steps two at a time, hearts thundering like a war drum.

“Abby? I’m coming,” I yell. I don’t give a shit how silly it seems, but the incessant need to let her know I’m here, that I didn’t leave and I’m coming for her, is undeniable.