Instead, he was asking how she was.
Was he one of those cops who liked to make friends with his suspects before he slaughtered them?
“I’m good,” she whispered, a tiny smile on her face as she motioned to him. A silence fell, and that’s when she accepted it really was that simple. He really did just want to talk to her. It warmed her. Her eyes rose to the scar in his left eyebrow, and she was unable to stop the words that left her lips. “Hey… can I ask you a favor?”
A line appeared between his eyebrows for only a moment, then vanished once more. “Depends on the favor.”
Veda scratched her forehead, frowning against the thoughts in her mind.
Gage is not your number ten.
Even as her mind spoke to her, her lips interrupted. “I have a list of surnames that purchased a sneaker prototype a few years back…”
He can’t be.
“…but only the surnames.” She took a deep breath. “The prototypes are valuable, only six in existence, auctioned off at top dollar. Nike won’t release the first names to me…”
Gage is not your number ten.
“…and I feel like a police detective might be a little more persuasive.”
The line between his brows stayed a little longer that time. “And why do you need these names?”
Veda licked her lips. Her heart churned to a stop.
Gage is not your number ten.
“I can’t say,” she answered.
His frown deepened. “Veda. In the short time I’ve known you…”
Veda raised her eyebrows because Linc had no idea how long they’d actually known each other. He had no idea that he’d saved her life ten years ago. He had no idea that he’d played the role of the one single shining beacon of light on the worst night of her life.
He could never know.
“In the short time I’ve known you…it’s become very clear how happy you are to put my job, and your life, on the line. Time and time again.”
Veda rolled her eyes.
“It’s become very clear that you think the entire world has a trust-fund-baby boyfriend ready to break their fall when times get tough.”
Veda held his eyes, waiting for his rejection.
He ran his hand down his shadowed jaw and then made a face, as if silently wrestling with his own thoughts. Then he sighed, almost in defeat. “Nike?”
Veda gasped, eyes lighting up as she came to her toes, nodding rapidly.
He couldn’t help a smirk at her instant change in demeanor, and he turned his head away when that smirk nearly bloomed into a full-blown smile. “What are the names?” He cursed under his breath the moment those words left his lips.
Veda shoved her hand in her scrub pocket quickly, before he changed his mind, the tips of her fingers brushing the bronze coin inside before she fished out a folded piece of paper.
She held the paper out to him, chest heaving.
Gage is not your number ten.
Linc took the paper between two fingers. He opened it, letting his eyes fall. He read the names.
Veda saw the exact moment he read the name ‘Blackwater.’ His scarred eyebrow hitched, the smile he’d been fighting finally spreading. He looked up at her, then let his amused gaze narrow over her shoulder.
Then he pushed the paper into his back pocket.
“Thank you, Linc,” she whispered, coming to her toes again, fidgeting under his knowing gaze. She wrung her hands together, biting her bottom lip to hide her smile. “And also… thank you for the other day. Hiding in the bathroom so Gage wouldn’t see you. Thank you for that.” He was silent, so she sputtered on. “I think Coco’s head must’ve hit the ceiling when she saw you in there.”
“My ears are still ringing from that scream. Surprised she didn’t crack the bathroom mirror.”
Veda laughed.
The memory seemed to lighten his eyes. “So things are good?” His voice lowered, and his eyes fell to the diamond on her ring finger. “With you and him?”
She crossed her legs at the ankle, the same way he was, distantly aware of the poisonous looks hitting her from every nurse who passed. “Things are great. He doesn’t work here anymore, and I’m a little sad about it, but… it’s for the best.”
“His family doesn’t take kindly to things not going their way. Ruthless at the drop of a dime. Guess he’s learning that for the first time in his life.”
Veda’s eyes fell.
“Lost his job,” he whispered. “And probably his trust fund too.”
Veda’s eyes narrowed.
“He really put it all on the line for you, huh?”
She lifted her gaze to his. “I told you. He’s different.”
He searched her eyes.
Veda drew in a breath. “In fact, just last night, he booked us on a Blackwater Cruise. Cabo. Four days. Sets sail in a couple weeks.” She pressed her lips together. “I’m guessing he has the kind of access to parts of that ship that most civilians never would. Might give me the perfect opportunity to repay you for looking into these prototype names, and for hiding in the bathroom.”
“You don’t need to repay me.”
“I want to.”
His face went hard. “I already told you I’m done letting you get tangled up in all this.”
“Your lips say you’re done”—she stared at his mouth for a moment before lifting her eyes to his—“but your eyes say something else.”
“Serial rapists make that same rationalization.”
She scoffed. “Just because you’re done doesn’t mean I’m done.”
“And again with the serial rapist justifications. You’re on a roll.”
Her eyes fell to his left hand, and she saw that his wedding ring was still gone. The ring that hadn’t left his finger since the day his wife had gone missing five years before, never to be seen or heard from again. She lifted a shoulder. “I’m just saying, now that Gage is on the outs with his family, this might be the last time he has unfiltered access to those cruise ships.”
“Veda….”
“Might be the last time I can get you the kind of information you’d need a warrant for. You know, the warrants that keep falling through? The warrants that will keep falling through for as long as the Blackwaters employ the best attorneys in town?”
Linc licked his lips and looked away, running his hand down his jaw.
Veda drank in his naked ring finger. “Linc, don’t you want to find her anymore?”
He cut a look at her. “All I think about is finding her.”
Veda straightened under his new, tight tone of voice. “So let me help you.”
“I won’t see you get hurt.”
“I won’t get hurt. I’m very careful. Sly like a cat.” I’ve been slicing balls left and right, and you still haven’t caught me. Veda kept that last tidbit to herself.
Linc’s eyes grew vulnerable. He looked back into the hospital room, to Sam and Eugene, saw she was still questioning him, and returned Veda’s gaze.
Veda nodded toward Eugene’s room. “Obviously you and I aren’t the only people on this island who are sick of the Shadow Rock elite. I have a feeling that their downfall will be more celebrated than vindicated. All it takes is one person with the balls to make the right moves. Ask the right questions.”
“No.”
His one-word response made her blood boil and she opened her mouth to argue with him more, but the sight of Gage over his shoulder, approaching from the other end of the hall, made them get lost in her throat. She pushed off the wall.
“Baby,” she said.
Linc snapped his eyes over his shoulder to see who she was talking to, saw Gage, and laughed softly.
Veda’s eyes flew back and forth between both of them, heartbeat picking up as she approached Gage, cupped his shoulders, and kissed his cheek. She didn’t miss the way Gage stared Linc down over her shoulder the whole time.
And her heartbeat tripled.
She looked back at Linc and saw that h
e was returning Gage’s gaze. The look they shared quickly went from a passing glance to a heated stare-down, and Veda felt her body moving into a panic.
“Uh… what are you doing here, baby?” she asked, stroking Gage’s arm tenderly, trying to defuse the flames she saw lapping in his eyes as he watched Linc.
“I decided to come down to visit Eugene and have a late breakfast with my fiancée,” Gage said, speaking directly to Linc. “Why am I not surprised to find Lincoln Hill right next to her?”
Veda’s eyes widened.
“I haven’t even been gone a day and you’re already sniffing around my girlfriend. You must be over the moon, huh?” Gage licked his bottom teeth. “Now that you’ll have her all to yourself?”
“Gage,” Veda breathed, horrified. “What in the world? Stop. Right now.”
Over her shoulder, she heard Linc chuckle.
That chuckle reddened Gage’s cheeks. He clenched his teeth. Narrowed his eyes.
Linc tried to walk away, but Gage breezed past Veda and moved in front of Linc before he could make it back to the room, blocking his path.
Faltering, Linc laughed again, stroking his jaw while trying to sidestep Gage and go around him.
Gage followed, blocking his path once more.
Patience depleted, Linc barreled into him, bumping his shoulder to get by. Linc hadn’t even taken another step before Gage retaliated, shoving him back, hitting his shoulder equally as hard as Linc had just bumped his.
Linc took the shove with another chuckle, but his tightened jaw proved he was anything but amused. Licking his top teeth, he froze, facing Gage, chest expanding. He let his eyes fall and stay down for a moment before slowly lifting them back up at Gage. Their broad chests heaved in time, and Linc let his fiery eyes live on Gage’s for a long moment—just long enough to make it clear that this was Gage’s only chance to never make that mistake again.
Then Linc resumed moving toward Eugene’s room.
Gage shoved him again.
Veda gasped because she saw it coming—the instant change in Linc’s demeanor. The lion that lived within coming out full force. Still, when Linc took Gage’s dress shirt under his tight fists, bared his teeth, and propelled Gage backward with all his might, a scream left her lips.
She clapped her hands over her mouth to stifle her shriek as Linc slammed Gage against the wall, but it was too late. Her cry had already caught the attention of everyone in the hallway, and Gage’s back had barely hit the wall before her colleagues were closing in.
“Stop!” Veda begged, stunned at how quickly this had all escalated as she flew across the room and tried to put herself between them. One minute they’d all been talking like civilized adults and the next….
Her lips parted to make room for the frantic gasps racing up her throat as Gage shoved off the wall and, with one swift move, managed to get Linc in a chokehold.
“Oh my God, Gage, stop!” Veda cried, looking at her boyfriend in horror, distantly aware of the equally alarmed chatter from her co-workers as they milled all around them. As Veda watched Gage’s face transform, darkening in a way she’d never seen before, terror filled her heart.
Gage is not your number ten.
Clearly it wasn’t Linc’s first time in a chokehold because in less than a second he’d slammed his fist into Gage’s balls, used the debilitating pain it caused him to release Gage’s arm from around his neck, threw an elbow into Gage’s abdomen in a blow that made him wheeze, and swiveled on his heel, locking Gage’s arm behind his back and slamming his cheek into the wall.
“Jesus Christ!” Veda screamed, all of this happening too fast for her to take any real action.
Thankfully, Dr. Britler appeared, and even though he was considerably thinner than the two men trying to kill each other, he managed to get between Gage and Linc, ungluing them from each other in the way only another man could. In the next instant, Dr. Britler had peeled them apart, shoving Linc to one side of the hallway with one hand while holding Gage against the opposite wall with the other.
“Enough!” Dr. Britler screamed, his chest heaving as he looked back and forth between the two. “Enough now!”
Veda’s chest heaved just as violently as Dr. Britler’s. As her wide eyes flew back and forth between Gage and Linc, both still glaring at each other across the hall, still seething as if they were both contemplating another attack, Veda was sure she was on the verge of a full-blown panic attack her damn self.
Her eyes remained riveted to Gage’s face. Tight, red, and feral in a way she’d never seen before.
He looked… violent.
Enraged.
Dangerous.
Veda drank in his angry face, and suddenly she was no longer gasping in shock.
Not because she wasn’t frightened, but because she couldn’t breathe.
Gage is not your number ten.
He can’t be.
4
The only thing that kept Veda level was the feel of his bicep clutched in her hand. As always, news had traveled through the hospital fast, and even as she dragged Gage to the first floor, four levels down from where he’d had his altercation with Linc, judgmental eyes hit them from all angles. She tightened her fingers around his bicep, feeling its strength, like a massive stone, and let it center her as she yanked him through the lobby and out into the hospital courtyard.
Outside, the sun glared down. The blare of ambulance sirens blew by at top speed as the trucks raced toward the emergency ward. Veda waited until the street was clear to pull him toward the water fountain pattering away in the middle of the parking lot. The trickling water relaxed her even more than the strength of Gage’s arm as they stepped onto the sidewalk that surrounded the fountain. A small rose garden encircled the fountain as well. The pleasant aroma entered Veda’s nose, finishing the job of easing her stress, so by the time she’d pulled Gage around the spray and out of view from their co-workers, her breathing had relaxed. Her hands no longer shook.
She released his arm and faced him. Crossing her arms, she went to spew the words that had been flying through her head since the moment he and Linc had behaved like two idiots on the fifth floor. But as her eyes narrowed past him and into the bushes across the street, the words caught in her throat.
The photographer. Tucked behind a line of bushes. Snapping pictures of both of them.
Veda’s eyes widened, and then she cringed, officially creeped out that someone wasn’t just following her and taking pictures but blatantly following her and taking pictures. She’d caught this guy red-handed not once, not twice, but three times. Clearly he wanted to be seen.
He wanted to be approached.
She almost did just that. She almost pushed past Gage and approached that man, but then realized she had more pressing matters at hand.
She looked back up at Gage, searching his eyes, a much lighter brown under the glare of the sun blazing down from the clear blue sky. Those brown eyes begged her for forgiveness without even saying the words. His chest heaved under his white button-down shirt, the adrenaline from his altercation with Linc still pulsing through him. His biceps flexed as if readying themselves for another fight.
Veda stared at the veins pumping in his arms. “Baby, what the hell was that in there?” Her eyes shot back to the bushes and she exhaled in relief when she saw that the man with the camera was gone. Only when she saw he was nowhere in sight did she give Gage all of her focus. “Where the hell did that come from?”
Gage swallowed thickly. The tension in his arms doubled, and his fists clenched. “He wants you.”
Veda threw her head back with a groan, covering her face with her hands.
His deep voice filled her ears. “You keep insisting he’s just your friend, but that’s not what I see when he’s with you. Which is all the time, Veda. He is always around you. It’s constant. And now that I’m no longer CEO of this hospital—”
“Gage.” Veda held her hands out in front of her, motioning for him to stop. Her engagement
ring glimmered under the sunlight. “I don’t know how many times you and I are going to have this same argument before I officially start freaking the hell out.”
Gage licked his lips, eyes going wide. He took a step away from her, stroking his shadowed jaw with narrowed eyes.
“You scared me in there. You scared me.” She covered her heart with her hand. “And I never thought I’d say those three words to you.”
He reclaimed her eyes.
Veda’s widened at what she saw in them. Did she have a reason to be scared of Gage? Once upon a time, before she’d returned to Shadow Rock, she’d put every ounce of trust she’d had into her gut. She’d never ignored her gut—her subconscious mind—the way she was fighting to ignore it right then.
Gage is not your number ten.
“You were like a complete stranger.” Her whispered voice trembled.
Gage is not your number ten.
“I didn’t recognize you.” She heard the beginnings of tears bubbling up.
The muscles under Gage’s jaw rolled. “He wants you.”
“He wants his wife, Gage. His wife who’s been missing for five years. His wife who he’s obsessed with finding. There isn’t a single woman in the world who exists to him who is not his wife.”
“Except you.”
Veda threw her arms out. “Even if you were right—which you aren’t—it still doesn’t give you the right to attack him just for talking to me. And, further, just because he supposedly wants me doesn’t mean that I want him back, does it?”
Gage’s eyebrows hitched. “You tell me.”
Veda sputtered. Shock blazed through her body and tightened her skin. She chuckled. “Wow.”
Gage’s face fell. He sobered. “Tell me.”
Veda licked her lips when she tasted venomous words on the tip of her tongue. She pointed at him with all her fingers flexed. “Maybe I haven’t made this clear enough since the very second we started dating, Gage, but my body belongs to me, and only me.”
Gage is not your number ten.
“You will never have the right to tell me what to do, or who to talk to. And this? This… jealousy?”
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