by Lissa Kasey
Kade barely smiled, and I knew he was still worried, upset, and terrified for me.
“The tow company said they will pick my car up and take it to the dealership.” That was the bonus of having a brand-new car still under warranty. Kade gripped my hand, then reached over to slide me against him. He buried his face in my neck.
“I’m okay,” I whispered.
He said nothing and barely seemed to breathe. Sophia was driving, but I didn’t know where to, as Kade had apparently checked me out of the hotel—my suitcase and Kade’s had been in the trunk when Micah had dropped his there next to his mother’s things—and I highly doubted we were going back to Sophia’s house. We were all tired, though the sky was just hitting full darkness for the night.
I used Kade’s phone to access my cloud and the list of things Kade had supposedly done as a youth. I checked Tony off the list, not believing for one minute that Kade had ever even met the guy. Hopefully tomorrow I’d be able to question him and get answers as to who really had tormented him.
It shouldn’t have surprised me when we pulled into the villa where I’d stayed when we’d come to rescue Kade. “Ship o’ Jacob,” I grumbled.
Kade’s grip tightened. “Just for the night. We go home in the morning. Ty said Jacob said it was safe and discreet.”
A man walked up to the car with the familiar gait of a guard: self-assured and ready for anything. Kade opened his door and took the set of electronic keys handed to him by the unfamiliar man, and then Kade put his crutches back together and got out while Micah opened the trunk for our stuff.
“Ollie, this is James Rantoff, the other bodyguard I hired at Haven,” Kade said once he was on his feet.
Odd how he was down here in Carlsbad with us. I narrowed my eyes at them, not knowing if I should voice my thoughts or not.
“He came down with me,” Kade said. “As a guard.”
My confusion deepened. Where had he been, then?
James held out a hand to me. I took it and shook, surprised that he didn’t try to give me the strongman clench. He was a big guy, boxy, but average enough that he didn’t look like just muscle. He could have been anywhere from his late thirties to early fifties, I couldn’t tell, and he was dressed normally enough in jeans and a T-shirt, with a windbreaker over the top to hide a gun. If it weren’t for the way he moved, alert, dangerous, and cautious, I’d have never known he was a guard.
“That explosion you?” James asked as he let go of my hand.
“Sort of….” I trailed off, not knowing where to start.
“Maybe I should have been shadowing them instead of trying to figure out where your old man is?” James quirked a brow at Kade.
Kade flushed when I looked at him. “I wanted to make sure if my family tried something again, I was prepared,” he told me. “I should probably have had Steven come down too, so he could shadow you.”
“Steve doesn’t pass as well. Too military. Not out long enough,” James pointed out. “You do it too, when Oliver isn’t with you. That rigid spine and ‘don’t fuck with me’ vibe. Hard to tail someone if you can’t be inconspicuous.”
Kade sighed and leaned into me. Again he was exhausted, and so was I. Micah and Sophia waited with their things. I was starting to come down from all the adrenaline as well, but I’d push through if I had too.
Sophia looked beat. Micah stood alert, not all that unlike James. His gaze scanned the parking lot for movement, and though he held his own bag and had his mom’s tucked by his side, his hands were free, ready if needed. God I hoped we could give him a more normal life so he wouldn’t have to expect trouble all the time.
“Rooms are clustered together,” James said. “I’ve already checked them. If you give me the keys to the car, I’ll move it closer so it will be covered by the cameras.”
Sophia handed him the keys without any debating. I suspected she was emotionally exhausted. She wouldn’t let go of Micah’s arm, and her grip was white-knuckled. Micah took one of the room keys from Kade and headed off in the direction James pointed.
“Theirs is a double,” James said. “Yours is a king.”
“And yours?” Kade prompted.
“I’m sleeping in the SUV we rented, parked right outside your door, and right next to where I’m moving their car.”
Kade frowned. I was pleased with the loyalty and dedication.
“Each villa has a full security alarm. Instructions are on the keycard holder. Arm it, and get some sleep. I’ll make sure the other room is armed after I move the car. These two share a private, gated courtyard, so I’ll walk through before bunking down for the night too.”
Kade hesitated a minute but finally began to move when James walked around the car to get to the driver’s seat. I retrieved both our suitcases from the trunk and followed Kade toward our hotel room. His shoulders were stiff, movements slow, tense, pain filled. He let me open the door but made me wait while he looked over the space.
Once inside I closed the door, locked it, and armed the alarm. The villa wasn’t the same one I’d stayed in when I’d been down here before to rescue Kade. This one was smaller, no sitting area, just a king-sized bed, a plush chair off to the side, and a luxury bath.
Kade dropped onto the bed and set his crutches aside. He dug his fingers into the thigh of his good leg, hissing when it seemed to hurt. I reached for him, pushing his fingers away and rubbing his strained muscles in a gentle massage. While the tension seemed to slowly drain away from his leg, his shoulders didn’t loosen at all.
“I’m okay,” I said again.
“Ollie…,” he whispered. His fingers wove through my hair, tugging me awkwardly up into his lap. I straddled his hips carefully so as not to put pressure on his legs. “I love you so much,” Kade breathed, his lips inches from mine.
I sighed and let my forehead rest against his, faces pressed together, hearts close enough to almost beat in tandem. “I love you too.”
“Please don’t do that again.”
I snorted. “That’s the plan. Blowing up is not my idea of fun.”
He groaned.
Sadly, my clothes were stiff from the chlorine, and my skin itched. I needed a shower. “Why don’t you lie down while I go shower. I probably stink.”
“You never stink,” he grumbled.
“Matter of opinion.”
“I love your scent.” But he let me go to shift his weight back on the bed. He used the side of the bed to kick off his one shoe and lay down, his eyes closing almost instantly, and the stiffness seemed to drain right out of him. “Don’t take too long,” he told me. “I want to hold you while I sleep.” And sleep was already pulling at him. His eyes were drooping. I rushed into the shower, taking only minutes, then returning nude and tired myself. My head hurt, but it was mild, sort of an irritation rather than something debilitating. I could handle the pain. It was probably because I was exhausted anyway.
Kade seemed to be mostly asleep by the time I shut off the lights. He let me tug him out of his clothes and then wrapped himself around me. And that fast I fell asleep too.
Chapter Twenty-Three
WHEN KADE was home, I was used to waking up to slow lovemaking. Only this morning it was voices, hushed, whispered voices, but still voices. I rolled over to find Kade’s spot beside me empty. The curtains were all still shut tight, leaving a sweet blanket of almost total darkness.
“I’ll follow them up until I’m sure they are well out of town, then head back.” It was James’s voice.
“As soon as Ollie’s car is done, we’re heading back too,” Kade told him. “The VW service center said they’d have it finished sometime this afternoon.” That meant I had only a few hours to question people, but I needed a vehicle to do so.
“I shouldn’t be gone long. Just don’t go anywhere.” James paused. “You’re armed, right?”
“Yes, for all the good it does me with crutches. I brought Ollie’s Tasers too.”
“Okay. Sit back, get some room service. I’l
l be back soon.”
“Did Sophie and Micah already eat?”
“Yes. Apparently they’ve been up for hours. Micah is the one who woke me by tapping on the window. He said his mom is reluctant to leave now, so he wants to get her out of town right away before she completely talks herself out of it.”
Kade sighed. “I had a feeling that would happen.”
“It’s a big change, but she seems like a strong woman. Plus, Micah knows how to manipulate her.” James let out a small laugh. “He plays up his need for her and she’s putty in his hands, ready to go. Can totally tell he’s yours.”
Kade was silent for a minute. And I knew what he was thinking. How much he’d missed, wondering where he’d gone wrong and how things had turned out this way. I reached out and touched his hip. He was perched on the edge of the bed. Dressed, which was disappointing. He turned slightly, hand gripping mine.
“Be back in a while,” James said. The door opened and closed.
I sighed. “Why are you dressed already?”
“’Cause I thought I was going to have to convince Sophie to go right away. But apparently Micah is all over that.”
I snorted, then pulled his hand toward me so I could kiss it. “He’s amazing. But he likes girls. Boobs and all. Good thing I have the original model,” I teased.
Kade turned my way, hands sliding under the blankets until he could pull my nude body against him. “That’s good since you’re all mine.”
I laughed as he kissed me, then dragged his bearded cheek over my flesh. I sighed. Maybe we’d start the morning right after all. But he didn’t move any farther south, and his grip on me seemed more desperate than sexual. “What’s wrong?”
He let out a long breath. “Nothing.”
It was a lie. We both knew it. The tension in his shoulders was worse than last night.
“Kade.”
After a moment of silence, he said, “I saw the list. You gave her the joint Haven email instead of your personal one.” He sighed. “I saw my sister’s name and thought it was for me. Didn’t know it was actually about me….”
“List?” Then it hit me. Oh. “The one your father is giving your siblings.” And the whole world, really.
“Yeah.” He rubbed his cheek against mine. “No wonder you were suspicious and distrusting.”
“Concerned, not distrusting,” I corrected him.
“I don’t remember,” he said. “If any of that’s true, I don’t remember it.” He settled his body against mine. I wished he’d come to bed without clothes but wasn’t going to push him away right now. “I was in and out of therapy so much that all I really remember are the trips back and forth. Home to the hospital. Hospital to home. Some of the worst bits of therapy I remember.” He paused, but didn’t elaborate on his therapy. “I don’t remember any party with Sophie. Or having sex with her, which apparently I did since Micah looks just like me. What if I did that stuff? What if I’m some sort of monster?”
I hugged him tighter. “You’re not.”
“How do you know? Maybe the therapy helped. Maybe it stopped me from doing more stuff.”
“I’ve already ruled out most of that list. The stuff highlighted in pink is stuff you couldn’t have done because you were institutionalized at the time.”
He was quiet for a minute, his arms around me tightening enough to almost hurt. He seemed to be debating something. Finally, he said, “One of the dogs I sort of remember.”
“Huh?”
“It’s not a good memory, and it’s fragmented. Sort of like a dream.” He pulled away, struggling to perch on the edge of the bed again, then took his phone out of his pocket. He navigated to my list and clicked on one incident in particular to open a picture of a small white Yorkie. “This one.”
I looked at the picture of the fluffy little dog, alert and seemingly smiling. Knew the police report, though I purposely hadn’t saved the gruesome details into the cloud, just the owner picture and a short notation with the date. It was listed as an animal torture and death incident. One of over a dozen. It was one of the few that had happened when Kade wasn’t in the hospital.
I slid up behind him and wrapped my arms around his chest, heart hammering in fear, nausea, and horror. Whatever this memory, he didn’t need it. Even if he’d only been an observer, I couldn’t imagine experiencing it firsthand. The details of the crime report had been beyond awful.
“It was horrible,” Kade whispered. “A really bad memory.”
“But that’s good,” I told him. “Even if you remember it, you obviously didn’t enjoy it.”
“Or maybe that is the therapy that reprogrammed me to realize what I did was wrong.” He didn’t sound convinced.
“Do you remember anyone being there with you?”
He shook his head. “It’s so fragmented. I remember the sound of the dog whining. Its pain-filled cries. The smell….” He jolted free of my arms and grabbed up his crutches, but only made it to the garbage can before he threw up, balancing in a half squat to keep himself from falling.
I wrapped myself around him, then peeled away his crutches to take his weight as his stomach revolted. I helped him down to his one knee and ran my hands through his hair and over his back, soothing. He trembled and dry heaved for a while. He obviously hadn’t had anything other than coffee. I’d need to get real food in him as soon as his stomach settled. He wasn’t as healed as he always seemed to lead everyone to believe. Why did no one ever see that but me? He should have been home, resting, maybe starting therapy, not chasing after me. “You should go home. Have James take you back as soon as he returns.”
“Not without you,” he whispered.
But what if some of it was true? Not that Kade killed that dog, but maybe he was there? What other memories would it awaken in him? Would he begin to have more bouts of PTSD fog like he had a few days ago? God, that seemed like a lifetime.
Once he seemed to stop heaving, I went to the bathroom and wet a hand towel to wipe his face. He sighed as I ran the cool cloth over his skin. “There is stuff from my time serving that should be worse. I think I’ve developed a sort of detachment to it. The idea that it was over there and not here…. This animal thing, not so much. I would never….”
And I believed that. The man who let me bring our cat with us to the grocery store or curled up on the chaise with me, making room for Newt, would never hurt an animal like that. “Don’t think about it,” I told him, more resolved than ever to prove he was innocent. Even if it was just to show Kade the truth, these lies had to end.
He turned, letting himself completely relax in my arms. It was then he realized I was still nude. “Shit, Ollie. Could you be any more beautiful? If my stomach didn’t feel like I’d just swallowed a mace, I’d be all over you.”
I snorted. “You can be all over me whenever you want.” I rubbed his back and ran fingers through his hair. “Do you need some antacids or something? You should eat.”
He groaned.
“We could both skip breakfast,” I offered, knowing it would kick him into nurture mode. If there was anyone more obsessed with my eating habits than Kade, I had yet to meet them. Thankfully he never came across as condescending or lecturing when nudging me to eat.
“We’ll eat,” he said after a minute. “We’ll eat, and when James comes back, we’ll go to the hospital and talk to this Tony guy.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Kade….”
“I have to know,” he said. “It’s in my head now. All this stuff. I have bits of memories of things that make no sense and big blanks for everything else.”
I gripped him tighter. “I think it was one of your siblings. The retired cop I talked to yesterday said he caught you and your brothers setting off fireworks but was told to arrest only you. And Sophia said your brothers used to blame you for everything.”
“I barely remember them. Sky…. Madison. Peyton, I sort of remember. I have this vague flash of her standing with her hands on her hips, looking angry at me. Ashlyn
and Xander I remember almost not at all.”
“What about your mom?” I wondered. His dad seemed to be in the thick of things, but he really never did talk about his mom.
He was silent for a while. “Is it weird that all I remember of her is a photograph? There was a family photo that had all of us in it that used to sit on the mantel. I was probably only a couple years old at the time it was taken. We were all young.” He gave me a tight smile. “Both she and I looked so odd in the picture, pale faces in a sea of black sameness. I don’t even think Ashlyn and Xander were in that picture. Or maybe they were. It’s a pretty foggy memory.”
“You’re the only one who looks like your mom?”
He nodded. “Isn’t that weird? My older brothers look like my dad. Peyton is more of a light brown than black. Xander is darker than me by only a couple of shades, more tan than black, but he has black hair and eyes. I’m the only blond one.”
And Ashlyn had gorgeous, dark caramel-brown skin, which was actually only a few shades darker than my own. Her hair had also been black and eyes dark brown. Kade was sort of the odd one out of the bunch. Genetics usually mixed better than that, but every once in a while, it threw a twist in fate.
He was quiet so long I knew he had to be thinking. Probably not ready to share yet either. I helped him to the chair and took the trash can into the bathroom to clean it. When I got back, he was still in the chair, staring off into the distance. I pulled out the room service menu, determined to get him to eat something. I needed my Kade back, and to get that he had to heal, physically and emotionally. Food was only part of the battle, but it was all I could do right this minute.
I ordered fresh fruit, avocado, and almond butter, gluten-free toast for both of us. Kade didn’t seem to notice. I made my way to the bathroom to clean up and dress as he did not appear to be in the mood to play. While I understood, I didn’t think letting him linger in self-doubt was good for either of us. If he didn’t pull himself out of it by after breakfast, I’d have to take matters into my own hands.
A quick call with Kade’s phone—I needed to replace mine—to Ty with questions, suspicions, and tests needed, and I felt better about my plan. Answers would help us both. For Kade it would probably unravel a good deal of his past, maybe even remove his self-doubt. And I’d feel safer having legitimate proof that I could use to protect him in the future.