Page 47

Chapter Forty-Six

Tanner

Warren’s footsteps pad down the stairs. My fingers fly across the keyboard, sending off my final email. Closing my laptop, I slide it across the kitchen bench and turn to face him.

“Kinsley?” I question with a raised brow. I shouldn’t be so abrupt, but fuck — I’ve only just met this guy and he has been with the enemy for the past fourteen years. Of course I am going to be hesitant to trust him. Jesse should be here dealing with this, and I should be up there with my girl.

“She’s asleep.” He pauses, looking over his shoulders and up the stairs. “I could sit there all night and watch her but she’s been through so much. I don’t want her to wake up and get a shock if I’m the first person she sees.”

I grunt, tilting my head in the direction of the spare room. “I’ll make sure the spare room is made up for you.” Leading the way, Warren follows in step behind me. Jesse had already cleared out most of Kinsley’s paperwork that she had collected over the years, but there are still a few old news articles lying around. I gather them up, stacking them neatly. Without turning around to face him, I place my palms flat on the dresser, leaning forward and dropping my chin to my chest. “Lance … Did they get him?”

“The police said they have him in custody, as well as the man who was driving for him. They had loaded four girls into the back of the van when Jesse and I took off, we spoke with them — tried to calm them down, then hid the four of them in a set of abandoned shearing quarters not too far down the road. Once you and Kinsley left to take Jesse to the hospital, I went back to check on the girls and used the driver’s phone to contact the police.”

Four fucking girls. How many more are there that we are no closer to finding? What was it, fifty-one or something on the file I received the other day? If Lance is locked up, someone else is going to step into King Dick position and will continue running the show. The police might believe having Lance behind bars will halt his operations, but he already has the pawns in his game doing the dirty work for him. This will continue, whether he is around or not. I need to know the ins and outs of this operation, so lucky for me I have someone standing behind me who has had their hands in it for over a decade.

“Tanner?” a sweet voice floats down the stairs interrupting my thoughts.

Warren gestures towards the door. “I’m okay here, this room has more than I have had over the years. We can finish this conversation tomorrow.”

I’ll have to make some calls, get the others to dig a little deeper. Hopefully, between my contacts and Warren’s intel, we can find the slimy bastards that will inevitably fall through the law enforcement cracks.

“Yeah, Pip, I’m here,” I say, walking out into the hallway, closing the door to the spare room behind me. She’s standing at the bottom of the staircase, trembling, with her arms wrapped around herself.

“I woke up and —” she looks to the ground, her eyes lacking the gold flecks I’ve come to love, “— I, uh, I was alone.”

Tipping her chin slightly so her eyes meet mine, I search for all the scars that live buried under the surface; I want to heal them all. “You’ll never be alone again. That I can promise you.”

I scoop her up into my arms to carry her back upstairs and, as we walk, she relaxes in my hold and nuzzles in against my chest. This isn’t at all how today should have played out. I can’t even stand here, and be grateful to have her back in my arms, knowing the circumstances that have brought us here.

In her bedroom, the French doors rattle gently in the summer breeze and I notice Lou has moved herself over to a blanket in the corner. I place Kinsley down on the left side of the bed, before stripping down to my briefs and climbing in beside her. She rolls towards me, placing her hand on my chest.

“This one’s new.” She inspects curiously, tracing my fresh ink with her finger, and I hum in response.

The little 444 sits directly across my heart. I got Carter to do it the night Jesse and I had the conversation about him needing me to protect her. The night he asked me to fulfil the promise he made to Kyle, if for some reason he was no longer able to. At the time I thought he was being irrational, but now …

“Why these numbers?” her voice pulls me back into the present.

“444 signifies protection,” I pause, tucking her hair behind her ear. “— and I made a promise.”