Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
Glancing at Walker, I noted how sickeningly pale he was now, but he was listening. I aimed the gun between Brix’s legs. “Unless you want to lose your dick, you’ll tell me what you’re talking about.”
The sirens were close.
Brix laughed cruelly. “Your dear old dad is dead, bitch, and it seems he left all his dough to you. Guess your stepmommy didn’t like that so much, so she called Nate and made a deal. Take you out for a million bucks.”
His words slammed through me. Like brutal punches pummeling the air out of my lungs. Panic suffused me, and my cheeks tingled with the oncoming warning of an anxiety attack. My vision blurred.
Not now, not now.
Walker’s murmur of my name reached through the stifling, crushing sensation gripping me, and I straightened my gun arm on Brix. “You’re lying.”
He shook his head, enjoying my distress. “I got receipts. Bitch thought we were two stupid thugs she could manipulate, but we got evidence she set this up. If I go down with Nate on this, I’m taking that cunt with me.”
“Why?” I demanded. Brix would really try to kill me for a lousy million dollars?
Nathan, sure. I could see it.
But Brix?
He understood and curled his lip in disgust at me. “Nate is the only family I got, and you betrayed him. Then your asshole boyfriend”—he glowered at Walker—“had some guys fuck me up for information. I’m ashamed to admit, I talked. Like a little bitch. So I had to come here. I had to do this for Nate. For me. The million dollars was just the cherry on the fucking top.”
The news that Walker had Brix assaulted for information wasn’t surprising. He’d told me he’d had guys talk to Brix and I’d heard the implication that they’d worked him over to get to the truth about Nathan’s whereabouts. Walker was desperate to protect me from Nathan, no matter the cost. He loved me. He’d do whatever it took. And I loved him. He was the only man I’d ever truly trusted. He’d taken a bullet in the gut, and it hadn’t stopped him from racing after me.
Feeling revulsion and hatred for the people who had brought this on us, I heard Walker’s breaths come faster and sharper as the police vehicles and an ambulance pulled up behind our cars. “You and Nathan are two stupid thugs. Neither of you could beat me. And if anything happens to Walker, I will spend the rest of my life making sure you never walk free again.”
Orders were suddenly barked at me to drop the gun.
I held up my hands a second later and then lowered the gun to the ground as police officers surrounded us.
“My boyfriend first,” I pleaded with them. “He’s shot. Badly.” The paramedics hurried toward Walker as the police ordered me to turn around. “Walker!”
He opened his eyes, groaning, and then rage flared in them when he saw they were arresting me. “No!”
“It’s okay!” I called to him. “Please,” I begged the officer arresting me. “Let me go with him. I was the one who was kidnapped! That bastard”—I kicked my leg toward Brix—“shot my man!”
“We’ll sort it out at the station.” The officer prodded me toward the car.
“I need to know he’s okay.” Hearing Walker call my name, I tried to turn around. “I need to know he’s okay!”
But they weren’t listening, and I found myself shoved into the back of the police vehicle, torn away from the man I loved as he bled out for me.
Forty-Two
SLOANE
No one would tell me if Walker was okay.
That fear kept me from focusing on Brix’s confession. What he’d said about my father. About Perry, my stepmom.
All I cared about was Walker. But the police wouldn’t talk to me beyond taking my statement and then shoving me in a jail cell.
That was until Brodan Adair swept in on a wave of rage with a very expensive lawyer at his side and demanded my release. An hour later, he was still trembling with fury at “police ineptitude” as he drove me to the hospital in Inverness.
“Callie?” I’d had the presence of mind to ask.
“Safe,” he promised. “She’s with Regan and Thane.”
Tears of utter panic choked me. “Walker?”
Brodan reached over and squeezed my shoulder, his expression grim. “Roe’s at the hospital with his mum. He’s in surgery.”
“Is he … will he …”
“I don’t know,” he replied, his voice hoarse with emotion. “I don’t know. But we need to get you checked over. That the police didn’t take you to the hospital first is a fucking disgrace.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine.”
I wanted to argue with him, but I decided it was quicker to shut up, allow a doctor to examine me, and get to Walker than argue about it with Brodan.
Brodan asked questions as we drove to the hospital, and I told him what Brix had told us, as if I were telling someone else’s story. It was surreal. Farfetched. Like something from a true-crime movie.