by Linzi Basset
“Who the fuck am I to judge her? When I had done much worse in my life? So much worse,” he berated himself, his voice sounded hollow in the silent night.
Beneath his day-old stubble, his mouth twisted into a scowl. He patted the pockets of his jeans and then his shirt. He retrieved a packet of cigarettes and lit one. He dragged the anesthetic essence of the nicotine into his lungs.
“Fucking bad habit. I should quit,” he mumbled when Baloo grunted and squinted at him—almost like he too berated him for smoking—but it offered him comfort, his coping mechanism. The ash drifted when he flicked the filter. He followed its path, like each floating piece was a moment of his life, sheared away. He inhaled deeply, letting the smoke seep into his blood. It soothed him, even if only for a small period of time.
Baloo growled warningly. This time, Keon took notice. It wasn’t his usual, I want attention growl. He’d detected something amongst the trees. Baloo sat upright; his eyes were wide and his ears perked up. Another growl sounded from him.
“What is it, Baloo?” Keon asked and squinted over the orange flames in the same direction. The bright fire prevented him from seeing anything apart from the dark outline of the trees. He walked around the bonfire with Baloo on his heels, his growls intensifying and growing louder. He was preparing to charge, with his canines bared, and his ears pricking up and down.
The huge Tibetan Mastiff stared alertly at the trees, his head slightly cocked. He stopped, keeping one of his fore-legs doubled up for a long time, like he was preparing for an attack. His nose twitched as he sniffed the air. Suddenly, his growls turned to soft whimpering sounds and then into an excited yowl before he bounded forward.
“Baloo! Get back here,” Keon cautioned and then sprinted after him, his gun drawn. Jack had made sure their ammunition was ready and loaded when they left the hospital. He sped up, wincing at the pain that shot from his leg wound. He ignored it and concentrated on shortening the distance between him and the bounding dog when he heard a fearful scream from the shadows of the first row of trees.
“Baloo. Stop.” This time the order was given in a deep growl. The large dog skidded to a halt and sat down on his haunches but kept giving soft barks. His tail wagged like he’d just received the biggest bone to chew on.
“Daddy!”
The next moment his arms were filled with the chilled body of his daughter. His arms wrapped around her instinctively even as he battled to comprehend how she came to be there. Baloo was now yowling and going berserk but he hadn’t moved from the spot.
“Beckie? Honey, what are you doing here? How did you—”
Another shape emerged from the shadows and Baloo growled in warning as he shuffled closer to Keon and Beckie. He was protective and possessive of those he cared for.
“We managed to escape,” the sultry voice intoned softly.
“Lauren?”
“Cynthia Marsh. Lauren . . . ceased to exist six years ago.” Her voice vibrated with hatred.
“Dad, do you think . . .” Beckie stared at the huge dog that sat looking at her with longing eyes. “Is it Baloo? My Baloo?” She asked in a trembling voice.
“Yes, my darling. It’s the same old Baloo.”
“Do you think he still remembers me?”
Her eyes were huge but trained on the large dog.
“Oh, I’d say he definitely remembers you. Go ahead, he’s dying to say hi. Just be careful—”
But his warning came too late as Baloo charged forward when Beckie took a step toward him and called his name. He flattened her in his excitement and then the sound of her laughter and his yowling barks filled the moonlit night.
Keon looked at the silhouetted woman who stood watching with her arms wrapped around her waist. Even in the darkness he could see her lithe form shivering.
“Escape?” He suddenly recalled her explanation. “From the way you clung to that bastard’s knees and crawled like a slave at his feet earlier, I sincerely doubt that. Where is that fucktard?”
Try as he might, Keon couldn’t keep the censure from his voice. His eyes turned to slits when she tilted her chin higher and glared at him. She appeared almost ethereal.
“Assumption is the mother of all fuckups,” she berated him quietly, keeping her voice low so that Beckie, who was still wrestling with Baloo, couldn’t overhear. “Who are you to judge me, Keon LeLuc? You have no idea who I am or what I have gone through . . . ohh . . .”
Keon saw her legs wobble and then give in. He surged forward to catch her before she crumbled to the ground.
“Mom!” Beckie cried and ran toward them. She tenderly brushed the hair from her face and then looked up at Keon.
He shifted his weight as he looked at the woman in his arms. For the first time in his life, he felt uncomfortable holding a female. There was something about her that had drawn him from the first glance.
Keon didn’t like how it made him feel. In fact, he resented it.
“She’s hurt, Daddy. If she hadn’t crashed into that tree, we would’ve . . . he would’ve . . . you have to help her. Please, I don’t want her to die,” she pleaded earnestly.
“Let’s get her inside. She’s as cold as ice.”
“She gave me her sweater when I got really cold,” Beckie volunteered. She had to run to keep up with Keon’s long strides as he walked to the Mediterranean style house.
Baloo already stood waiting for them at the side entrance with his tongue rolling to one side. His tail hadn’t stopped wagging since he’d sensed Beckie.
“Open the door, sweetheart, I need to see how badly she’s hurt.” Keon directed his daughter.
Beckie followed him as he made his way through the dark living room and into the dimly lit reception hallway effortlessly. She looked around, her eyes as wide as saucers.
“Wow! Is this really your house, Dad?”
Keon chuckled as he began climbing the stairs. He had chosen the mansion—it was modern, stylish and the fact that it bordered Rhone’s estate, made it a no brainer. It was the complete opposite of the one they used to live in; a Victorian style house in a well-populated suburb in Santa Monica, Los Angeles.
“Our house, Beckie. This is now our house,” he smiled at her pleased look. He frowned and then scowled when he noticed the cut on Beckie’s forehead for the first time.
“You’re bleeding.”
“Oh, I forgot about that,” she mumbled as she tentatively padded her fingers over the cut. “Mom taught me ‘mind over matter’ when she was teaching me Jiu Jitsu.”
“You are training in martial arts?” Keon asked with a dark look. She had always been a little princess and had loved to dress-up and play with dolls. He couldn’t envision her kicking and chopping the air.
“Put me down.” Lauren, who had been observing the interaction between father and daughter silently, spoke up.
“Keep still,” Keon snapped when Lauren began to struggle. He shouldered open the door of one of the bedrooms. “Switch on the light, poppet.”
Lauren hissed when Keon placed her on the bed and she reached out to balance herself.
He took her arm and touched the swelling around her wrist.
“Let me go. I’m fine.” Lauren found it difficult to understand the rush of emotions flooding her mind from his touch. Her body still tingled from being held against his hard body.
“You’re not fine. Your wrist is either sprained or broken. How did it happen?”
“It must’ve been during the crash. I think it twisted back when I caught and held on to Beckie,” she said quietly, watching how small her hand looked where it rested in his huge palm.
“Can you move your wrist at all?”
She tried and winced when pain flashed through her brain.
“Hmm,” Keon murmured and gently inspected her wrist for ligament damage. “The mild swelling and the fact that the pain seems centralized on this spot indicates a sprain. Where else are you hurt?”
“I got a hard bump on my head. I think I hit the sid
e of the van and the wound on my hand ruptured again.”
“Which wound?” He grabbed the other hand and studied the bandage that were soaked with her blood. His jaw turned rigid at the implication as he recalled the ‘gift’ Adam had sent Samantha. “Jesus, he fucking really—”
Her fingers on his lips quieted his intended outburst. She moved her eyes in Beckie’s direction.
“It’s okay. It doesn’t hurt anymore,” she whispered dejectedly. The shock she’d experienced, on the day William—aka Adam, had forced her to submit to his knife play that had resulted in her losing her pinky, still woke her up at night. The excruciating pain, when he’d sliced the sharp knife through skin and bone, was a memory cast in a blaze of red hatred.
“I’m going to get a gel pack to reduce the pain, swelling and inflammation. I’ll phone Ethan—a very good friend and a doctor—to come and have a look at your hand.”
“That won’t be necessary,” she said dolefully.
“Yes, it is. Besides, I want him to check the cut on Beckie’s forehead. I suspect she might need some stitches.”
An hour later, Ethan had taken care of their injuries and left them with instructions to care for their wounds.
Lauren stood in the doorway of Beckie’s room and watched Keon put her to bed. It had always been her duty—the special thirty minutes at night when she would join Beckie in the bed and they would share stories of their day and make plans for their future. A future that would never materialize, but Lauren never had the courage to tell Beckie.
She could see it was an emotional experience for him, in the way he hugged Beckie, over and over, like he couldn’t believe she was there. She didn’t even want to consider what the future had in store for them now. Because Keon’s expression, every time Beckie called her mom, said that he had every intention of putting an end to that.
“How did you manage to escape Adam?” Keon asked mildly. Their eyes caught and she was taken aback with the color eyes of his eyes, so similar to Beckie’s, so warm and full of life. But at the moment, they were glimmering like hard diamonds, filled with mistrust.
“Mom was very clever. We have a code for everything. And for danger, it was little red riding hood. So, when she said those words and winked at me in the rearview mirror, I knew she was planning to do something and I held onto the seat,” Beckie volunteered. It was evident that Beckie adored the woman who hadn’t moved closer and stood watching them from the door.
“Yes, and?” Keon prodded, looking inquiringly at Lauren. The question was clear. He wanted the story from her.
“When we rounded a bend just as we were crossing the river, I swerved sharply and accelerated. We collided with a huge bur oak tree next to the road. I noticed Beckie flying forward and grabbed for her, which was when I must’ve hurt my wrist.” She became uncomfortable under his close scrutiny and crossed her legs.
The movement drew Keon’s gaze to her tiny feet. Barefoot, the bright pink color on her toenails shimmered gaily in the light. He forced his gaze back to her face, trying to ignore the perfect ankles and calves on the way. He felt a stirring in his groin.
Fuck. How is it possible that she arouses me? She, of all people.
Keon resented her. It was completely unfounded, he acknowledged that, yet he couldn’t seem to get past the fact that she had benefited from his daughter’s love and attention for the past six years, while he’d been mourning her death.
“William . . . Adam, had no warning. He’d moved to the front seat a couple of miles out of Charlottesville. He was livid. I’d never seen him that angry before. I was afraid of what he might do to . . .” She swallowed and straightened. “Anyway, he wasn’t wearing the seat belt and went flying through the windscreen—head first. It took a couple of minutes for me to find my bearings but as soon as I did, I grabbed Adam’s phone but lost it somewhere along the way. We just ran. I had to get Beckie as far away from him as possible. He was unconscious and his face was . . .” she shuddered at the memory of his bloodied face, “pretty badly cut and he was bleeding from a wound in his throat. I know it’s an awful thing to say but I pray that he wouldn’t survive.”
Keon didn’t volunteer the information that they’d found the van but that there had been no sign of Adam Baxter. Beckie didn’t need to know that.
“How did you find out where I lived?”
“Beckie told me your name, so I phoned a colleague who is very good with computers and has contacts in the police force. He found your address through a friend of his. An elderly couple picked us up a couple of miles up from the accident and brought us to Burke. We took a cab from there. And . . . we managed to squeeze past the side of the gate.”
Keon frowned. It was an oversight he was glad he hadn’t fixed yet. The palisade at the front of the estate was rusted and needed to be replaced. Now that Beckie was home, it would be the first thing he’d get done.
“Mom had to give her mother’s diamond necklace to the cabbie because we didn’t have any money,” Beckie interceded.
Keon noticed the flash of sadness in Lauren’s eyes at the mention of the necklace.
“First her ring and now her necklace. Now I have nothing of her left to . . .” She swallowed down the lump that choked her.
“Don’t cry, Mom. At least we’ve managed to escape from him,” Beckie tried to console her.
“Mom?” Keon growled. It grated on his nerves every time she said it.
Lauren moved her weight from one foot to the other, “He arranged for me to legally adopt her.”
Keon straightened. The look he gave her could’ve melted entire Iceland. He didn’t bother to hide his hatred from her.
“You can’t adopt a child when her father is still alive!”
Beckie gasped at the anger she could detect in his voice. She stared at him fearfully.
Lauren straightened her shoulders and tilted her chin back.
“Don’t take your anger and frustration out on me, Keon LeLuc! It’s not as though I was given a choice.”
Beckie uttered a shocked cry and Lauren hastened to her side. She sat down next to her and hugged her.
“No, no, poppet. I didn’t mean that I wouldn’t have done it if offered the opportunity. I love you with all my heart, you know that. I wouldn’t trade you for anything.”
“Really?” Beckie asked in a small voice.
“Yes, my darling. Legally, I am your adopted mother.” She shot a heated glance at Keon. “And no one is going to change that.”
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Miss March, or should I say, Lauren Francis.”
And with that, the gauntlet was thrown. Lauren realized that he could void the adoption. Because it hadn’t been her real name on the legal documents.
Keon LeLuc would do everything in his power to keep his daughter by his side and from the expression on his face, Lauren knew . . .
She wasn’t part of the future he was envisioning.
Chapter Two
The jagged white edge of a broken radius bone cut through the skin of his forearm and blood ran freely in thick scarlet rivulets down his hairy arm, matting them before it soaked into his, once pristine, white shirt.
He clenched his teeth as he yanked his black tie off and tied it around the gushing wound in an attempt to stem the blood flow.
“That fucking bitch is going to pay for this. She would pray for death before I’m done with her,” Adam Baxter grated through thin lips. The pain vibrated in his voice. He’d searched the van for his cell phone to contact his ‘secret’ team for assistance but gave up when the pain swirled around him, threatening to take him under again.
“The little whore must have taken it.”
His head swung sideways and he listened intently. He could hear the hum of a vehicle approaching in the far distance. It didn’t take a genius to know who was behind the wheel. With the technology at hand and Max Shaw’s expertise, it would’ve been easy to trace the van and from there, find the location via satellite.
&nbs
p; He bit back the groan as he pushed himself upright against the side of the van. His face throbbed incessantly, not to mention the blood dripping onto his chest and shoulders, shrouding the white shirt in a bouquet of carnation-like splotches.
The intense pain of his flesh being torn from his bones as his face shattered through the windscreen, made him nauseous. His stomach roiled but he swallowed the acidic phlegm down. He refused to think how badly he’d been cut, but from the amount of blood and the ferocious burning, he knew it was gory. The desire to look burned in his mind but he repressed it and avoided the side-view mirrors when he eventually managed to shake loose of the shards of glass embedded in his face and shoulders.
He began to walk and it soon turned into a quick run. He had to get as far away from the accident scene as he could before Rhone Greer’s entire team arrived.
In the stillness of the night, the sound of the vehicle was still in the far distance but he continued to run, clutching his broken arm against his waist.
“Argh! Fuck me,” his hoarse, painful scream echoed in the night as a torrent of rain drops suddenly soaked him. The cold water burned into every wound as he ran. The pain became one central throb in his guts. Deep and warm, but not in a nice way. It felt like someone had their hand in the wounds and was squeezing and tearing at them with vengeance. Yet, he hurried on, he couldn’t afford to stop. He concentrated on his breathing. Slow and deep, repeating the words in his mind until it became a mantra.
“Vengeance is sweet. She will suffer.”
His breathing became haggard and his legs burned with every step he took but he continued on until it felt like his chest was about to burst in flames.
“Vengeance is sweet. She will suffer.”
By his calculation he was a couple of miles from the accident scene already. One good thing about the rain was that it had washed away the trail of blood he’d left behind.
He sighed in relief when he came upon a farmhouse. The lights were on and he hurried to the front door.
The old farmer’s shocked cry didn’t bother Adam but what rocked him back on his heels was the repulsion on the farmer’s face at his appearance.