Page 40

Kai

"She’s in San Diego."

Vincent Costa, former private military and my fixer of sorts, exhales a lungful of smoke, his face grainy on my laptop screen. A perpetual scowl etches deep lines into his forehead—wrinkles earned from war zones, back-alley deals, and the kind of jobs that never make the news.

His graying hair looks damp—I’m not surprised. It’s a rainy night, and he’s been out for most of it.

I press my glass to my lips, then let the whiskey sit on my tongue before swallowing. It burns, but it doesn’t cut through the weight in my chest.

Four hours. That’s how long it’s been since I ran Nicole out of town.

A part of me was worried she wouldn’t go. The Nicole I know would call my bluff. It was probably a good thing she couldn’t see past her own crushing guilt and shame.

Vin takes another drag, eyes scanning something else on his desk—probably his surveillance gadgets. "She checked into a motel under a fake name. Paid in cash. Hasn’t made any calls."

A muscle ticks in my jaw. She’s scared.

I wait for the pressure in my ribs to ease before setting my glass down beside my laptop. "Did she use her van?"

"No. Took a bus out of town."

Smart. Even spiraling, she’s thinking. She knows her van is too easy to track.

I exhale slowly, linking my fingers together tight enough to crack the knuckles. "Is anyone tailing her?"

Vin shakes his head. "Not yet. What’s the directive for her?"

I sigh, rubbing a hand over my jaw. Getting her out of Valencia had been my priority when I went to see her tonight. Of course, my cock had other ideas . . . until I got fucking poleaxed.

Nicole is Cass’s stepsister.

Now it all makes sense—why she seemed to hate me on sight. Why she fought her feelings for so long. She probably thought she was playing the long game. Hoping to ruin me. To get her revenge.

But the woman I took to Gstaad was just as wrecked as I was.

And the stalking . . . fuck.

That was the greatest surprise of all. A small smirk curls at my lips.

Finding out the woman I’m crazy about is twice as unhinged . . . well that roused every demon inside me. It took everything I had not to break character and show her she was in great company. The kind of man who’d want his name tattooed on her skin.

And I just might have . . . if I hadn’t seen those crow feathers on her desk . . .

Those feathers meant that she had a target on her. The priority was to get her away from anyone who could get hurt. It’s easier to watch one person than a whole fucking town. Bea. Frank. Her dance therapy kids. Her friends. And I won’t put it past that motherfucker not to cause a mass murder just to get to the woman I love.

"Tell me about the blackmailer, first,” I say.

Vin exhales another puff of smoke. "I scraped Miss Abbott’s laptop. The guy goes by Anon419. He’s a deep web operator, bounces signals through a shit-ton of proxies. Looks to be coming from eastern Europe, but we’re confirming his location as we speak.” He leans forward slightly, flicking through files. "And he’s not just some hacker. He’s an extortionist. Finds dirt, then bleeds his targets until they break."

The pressure in my skull builds.

"And Nicole?"

"He’s been on her for months. Started slow, got nastier over the last few weeks,” he says, then hesitates.

"Spit it out, Vin,” I snap.

"He has nudes of her sister. He’s yet to break out publicly, but has enough to keep Nicole fully compliant."

The words should register. They should process like everything else in this nightmare, but they don’t.

My fingers only wrap tighter around the scotch glass.

That fucking stubborn woman. She has me—in every fucking way a man could be had. In her heart. Wound around her fingers. On my knees.

I don’t mind the obsession . . . collecting knick-knacks . . . not in the least. But buying pictures of me off the dark web like I’m some pipe dream? Refusal to trust me enough to speak to me when she was in trouble?

Seriously, what the fuck else does she want?

A sharp crack. Then, fire laces through my palm. I look down to find a shard of glass digging into my skin, blood welling, then tracing a slick path down my wrist as scotch spills to the floor. I barely feel the sting of the spirit.

Vin clears his throat. "You okay there?"

No. I’m not fucking okay. But that’s not the point. "Find that son of a bitch.” My voice is barely audible.

Vin doesn’t react. "And?"

My gaze locks onto his. "Put him in the ground."

Vin lets out a short exhale, smirking around his cigarette. "Figured you’d say that."

I push off the table, rolling my shoulders, still flexing my bloodied hand. "And Vin?"

"Yeah?"

"I want that death mailer—the one sending all those feathers. Alive, preferably.” I’d like to kill him myself. Slowly.

Vin watches me for a second, then flicks his cigarette into an ashtray. "I’ll have him by the end of the week."

"Good."

Nicole can only hide out for so long.

I’m about to exit the video chat when Vin stops me.

“What?” I ask.

"You say this is the fourth time he’s hit in fifteen years. Yet you’ve let the authorities rule it out as accidental death or suicide."

“Your point?”

He lights up another cigarette. "What’s different now?"

The room thickens with weight. I glance at my still-bleeding hand. At the shattered glass on the floor. Then back at Vin’s weathered face.

And all I see are blue eyes that have seen too much yet never lost their sparkle. A heart and body broken too many times, yet fiercer than most. A woman who mirrors the darkness lurking inside me.

Mine.

"The killer didn’t have my full attention then,” I reply. “Now he does."

Vin nods, somehow understanding the simple truth. That if I lose this woman, there won’t be anything left of me worth saving.