WIN THE GAME

by Allison, Ketley

  Come on, Theo, get angry.

  “I didn’t deserve it,” I said. “Yet you helped me anyway. Why?”

  “Scarlet…” Kai warned.

  “Why, Theo?”

  “You need to rest,” Theo said carefully. “Once we move you—”

  “I’ll rest when you do.”

  “Then you’ll sleep in your grave,” Theo replied.

  Like a time bomb that ticked to 0:00, I clued in. “That’s how you got out of custody. You made a deal with them, too.”

  Theo startled, then said, “I had to, in order to be released.”

  “No,” I said, all the while gathering my thoughts. “Before. You made a deal with them long before reaching out to me again. That’s the only thing that makes sense. You … you…” I stared at the floor, then back up to him when clarity hit. “What did they promise you? What did Kai promise you?”

  “Scarlet,” Kai said, “You’ve just been through some pretty epic events. Perhaps it’s better if we regroup, then—”

  “Don’t treat me with kid gloves,” I snapped. “Both of you, tell me the truth. Tell me what the hell that was out there. Why Chenko wanted me dead. Why Gordon Saxon put a hit on me.”

  When neither of them said anything, I stood, dropping the sack of ice to the floor. “One of you better speak.”

  “I love you.”

  Theo’s words stilled the room. My chest wouldn’t even dare rise and fall in such resulting, sweeping silence.

  “I love you,” he repeated, his eyes anchoring mine. “Which is why I felt like someone was removing my organs, one by one, when I realized what you’d done. Who you made a deal with, what you were willing to do.”

  Speechless, I stepped toward him, hand raised … beseechingly. Terribly. Uselessly.

  He used his own hand to halt any further steps. He said, “Which is why, despite all that, I understand the why in everything you’d done.”

  My lips parted, and while my vision pooled, blurred, I couldn’t summon the strength to blink tears onto my cheeks.

  “If I remember anything about my cocktail waitress, my girl, it’s her loyalty. To those she cares for, she’d do anything to protect.”

  “You can’t do this,” I whispered through the thickness. “You can’t treat me like this, knowing what I’ve done to you.”

  “And you should remember I do whatever the fuck I like,” he replied, but it was with softness, a satin he’d only reserved for us, in dreary mornings, during dusky nights. “I’m not going to pretend I’m not angry, that I wouldn’t want to pull one of these wooden beams off the ceiling and use it to stake something. Someone.”

  “That’s been your entire life,” I said. “Punishment. Solutions through beatings, rage.”

  “Yes,” he said. “And it took whatever soul was left in me to walk away from you instead of stay and fight for you that night.”

  I shook my head. “Stupid. That’s the word I come up with if you’d stayed. But it took me a really long time, this moment, to realize that.”

  “And yet I’ve put you in the same position you were two years ago. With your life at risk.”

  “Because I’m so innocent,” I snapped. “I know the part I’ve played in this. But you still haven’t told me how you’re involved.”

  I love you. The words stayed near but were just far enough that they were difficult to grasp. With the time between us, the deaths, the torture, a gun in my hand mere days ago, pressed against a man’s head. Love couldn’t be forged within trauma like that. It shouldn’t. I should be reeling, puddled in a corner, tremoring out the brutal realization that somebody died at my bidding, another man was betting on my death, and all the danger, all the reasons for my motives and the workings of my current fucked-up inner circle came back to…

  Him.

  “I’m telling you the truth,” Theo continued. “I made a deal. I’d testify against my father, Trace, and I’d work on my younger brother to do the same, in exchange for immunity.”

  “Immunity?” I asked.

  “Yes. I’m out because I swore I’d be a key witness.”

  “Wait, you came out of custody the legal way?”

  Theo nailed me with a wry, chastising look. “Not everything I do has to be through questionable channels.”

  “But this puts you in incredible danger,” I said. “Your father will be…”

  “Rage-fueled. I know. But he’s behind bars at the moment.”

  “You could die for this,” I whispered.

  “You were going to die for me. A second time. I couldn’t simply let that go.”

  “But the whole Saxon crime syndicate…”

  “Is falling apart at the seams,” Kai chimed in. I’d forgotten he was there, so immersed was I in Theo’s aura. “There was a hit on you for a reason. The fact that a girl could pick apart the Saxon dynasty, despite making deals with dirty agents, despite being watched thoroughly. You pissed Gordon Saxon off so badly he made mistakes. Starting with the assumption that you’d tap on that necklace the instant you saw the chance.”

  “He doesn’t know me. He never will,” I said.

  “We’re going to make sure of that,” Kai said. “You feel okay? Can you start moving again?”

  “Yes,” I said, then with more firmness, “Yes. I can.”

  “Okay. Let’s go,” Theo said.

  He offered his hand, and after slight hesitation, I took it.

  The three of us made our way out of Kai’s apartment and behind the building, where a nondescript black car idled. I supposed they’d give me verbal directions to tell me where to go. The first few hours of being dead would be through roadways, over bridges, a drive into the unknown and perhaps permanent.

  My throat swelled.

  “Here,” I said to Kai and pressed the crumpled note I’d scrambled to write in the bathroom. “Give this to Verily to give to my parents.”

  Kai’s mouth went grim.

  “Please,” I insisted. “Read it. It doesn’t say much. Just that I love them and—and…” I collected myself, aware of Theo’s intense scrutiny a few feet away. “And to never blame themselves. They have to know something, Kai. I can’t leave them after everything they’ve been through—”

  “All right,” Kai said, tucking the note into his pocket. “I’ll do it.”

  “Promise me.”

  “Yes. I promise.”

  “I’m coming back,” I said, holding his stare steady as he passed me the duffel bag. Kai didn’t answer, but there was no need for him to. Forever wasn’t a term to be thought about right now. Only the present and getting out of here before Gordon Saxon blanketed his rage over NYC and upped the price on my head. To utilize the time Theo gifted by having me presumed dead.

  In a fit of emotion, I threw my arms around Kai and pulled him close. “This isn’t goodbye.” I buried my face in his neck. “This is thank you.”

  “I know,” he said, rubbing my back with light swipes. It was clear he was holding it in as much as he could—the outburst, the need to come along, the desperation that this was our last shot at safety. “I love you, too. And I’ll buy you as much time as I can.”

  I nodded, then let go.

  Theo’s presence was like a magnet, a hot pull against my skin, goosebumps prickling the flesh where he was closest. But in order to survive, I had to avoid it. If I leapt into his arms, if I held onto him, I wouldn’t let go. I’d scream and cry and beg to stay with him. Just one more night. A few more moments with him and it’d be over.

  I loved him, too.

  Avoiding eye contact, I opened the drivers’ door, but jerked back when it met resistance.

  The source of the door not opening all the way was Theo, standing steady, his hand gripping the top.

  His emotion was entirely in his voice when he said, “You’re on the passenger side.”

  “What?” I looked to Kai like he’d have answers, but he seemed as confused as I was.

  “Scarlet,” Theo said, drawing my attention back
. “Have you not figured it out yet?”

  “I…” The duffel bag was a heavy weight at my feet. “No. I don’t think so.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  My heart flew sky-high at the same time I said, “No, you’re not.”

  Theo cocked a brow. “I am.”

  “No,” I said again, then pointed in the direction of Kai. “You have immunity, you need to testify to keep your father behind bars, to get Trace life in prison. You have things to do here, important matters.”

  “Do you really think I’m going to wait in some city apartment for my moment to testify? I’ll be killed just for stepping out for some coffee.”

  I pursed my lips.

  “It’s the best cover,” he said. “You presumed dead. Me in the wind. My father’s syndicate will never die. He has people, even now, crafting a list to make witnesses disappear, to destroy any evidence, to essentially make it so he’s the cleanest businessman there ever was to be dragged to the precinct.”

  “But…”

  Theo grabbed my hand, his dry callouses like rubbing velvet the wrong way against my skin. “Perhaps the trial will be successful, or my father and brother will take a plea. But I am not about to bet my odds against something so unsure. Not when it comes to your life. So, I’m going with you. I’ll stay with you. Return when I have to testify. Then leave again.”

  I shook my head, dumbfounded over the probability that I was no longer in this alone. That Theo Saxon, a man I’d pushed out of my mind for so long, was waltzing back in to drive me off into the sunset.

  I shoved at his shoulders, and he fell back, shocked.

  “You do not get to do this!” I shouted at him. “After all we’ve been through, after the years you spent giving me no hope for us, you do not get step in at the last minute and promise me everything.”

  My voice rose and fell, hitched, broke, and I blinked crazily, catching tears in my lashes but most falling onto my cheeks. “I have no hope left,” I breathed out roughly. “You’re not allowed to give me that kind of flame again. You can’t. You can’t—”

  “Scarlet.”

  Theo rounded the open door and pulled me to his broad chest, the smell of him all-consuming and melting, but I pushed away. Then pushed again. But he wouldn’t let go. So I pounded with closed fists, but they opened, went limp, as he murmured in my ear and I sobbed.

  “I’m not making the same mistake again,” I heard him say. “I’m with you. You understand? You are my hope, Scarlet. You. And I’m not letting you lose anymore.”

  “Theo,” I cried into the skin of his neck. “There’s no chance…”

  “There is.” He stroked back my hair, the ponytail mussed from my fight. “And goddamn it, we’re going to find it.”

  It was almost physical, the way my lungs expanded yet it was my heart that filled. A stitch falling off, no longer needed, because that section—the broken, jagged piece left by my sister and clotted by Theo’s departure—was healing. And with compelling clarity, I didn’t search for ways to reopen it. I folded into his embrace instead. And dared to believe.

  “Guys,” Kai said. “You have to go. Now.”

  Kai eyed Theo as we parted, and he squeezed my hand when I passed him to get into the car. “You sure about this?” he asked Theo over the car’s hood.

  “Never been more so,” Theo said, then folded into the vehicle and started the engine.

  I glanced through the window at my friend, a man who’d become my partner in more aspects of my life than I thought possible. I pressed a hand to the glass, and he lifted his.

  Until we meet again, I mouthed to him.

  Kai sniffed, then swiped under his nose. It was the only sign of upset he gave before he smacked the side of the car, giving Theo the go ahead. Theo made a three-point-turn, and we drove out of the alley-way, through the avenues, and over the Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan glittering its morning dew over the river.

  I covered Theo’s hand over the stick shift. He flipped his over and held tight.

  Whatever happened next, whoever I had to become, it wasn’t going to be alone this time. We were in it.

  Together.

  31 Paradise

  The ocean was the deepest azure I’d ever seen, a close second to the color of Theo’s eyes.

  Clad in his button-down shirt, I turned away from our tiki hut’s small patio and into the bamboo styled room, where Theo was just finishing up our breakfast. His scar was tamed today with a light application of my foundation, the closest we came to disguising his distinguishing mark from curious—or shrewd—stares.

  “We should see the ruins today,” I said to him as I resumed my position, curling my legs under me on the couch beside him.

  “Have you not gotten your fill of the Mayan temples yet?” Theo asked, gliding his finger down the opening of my shirt. “Because I can think of a few other things we could do.”

  “We already did that,” I said, laughing as I pulled in the collar, dislodging Theo’s hand. The sound felt brilliant in my throat, a musical instrument that had been occurring more and more lately.

  “And?” He pushed aside his empty plate, his grin sexy and mischievous. “Let’s do it again. And again.”

  “We can’t.” I laughed again and pushed him away. “I have an appointment, remember.”

  “Cancel it.”

  “I already have. Twice.”

  He nuzzled my neck. “Third time’s a charm.”

  “Mister Channing,” I managed to say within my moan. “If I don’t go to this one, they’ll never allow me to book there again. And I need to.”

  He growled but lifted his head. “Fine, Mrs. Channing.”

  Theo’s cell rang, and he grumbled as he rose to get it. “Seems you’re not the only one,” he said.

  I smiled at his back, those delectable muscles between his shoulder blades rippling as he walked to the other side of our small suite to retrieve his cell.

  I picked at a cluster of grapes as he answered.

  “Yeah?” he said.

  Silence.

  I looked up, primed for what had been eight months of waiting. After leaving New York City, we boarded a flight with new passports, provided by Kai, to the Philippines and have been bouncing around ever since. When news of the workings of the Saxon trial reached us—plea deals were still being negotiated, if taken at all—we’d unobtrusively moved closer and were now in Tulum, Mexico, the nearest we’d ever been.

  Initially charged with murder, Gordon Saxon faced eleven felony charges, the worst being the killing of me, Scarlet Rhodes. But once the dental records came back as not a match to my supposed body, that charge would likely be dropped and news of the possibility I was still alive would reach his ears. But he still had those other bodies to contend with, and kidnapping, false imprisonment, conspiracy to commit murder.

  Trace faced multiple counts of assault with a deadly weapon along with conspiracy to commit murder. Drea, his latest victim, refused to testify, but that didn’t prevent the evidence from mounting against them both.

  Would Trace and Gordon get off with the minimum felony charges? That was a large possibility, hence my new moniker of Madison Channing, with my husband, Darren Channing, currently enjoying our “honeymoon.” But with the small chance of their being jailed, I could come back to city and see my parents face-to-face, rather than secret notes and coded postcards passed to them hinting that I was okay.

  I’d come to accept that I’d likely never return as Scarlet Rhodes, at least not officially. I’d made an enemy of the Saxons—that domino falling years ago—and they held grudges. But with Theo by my side, it didn’t feel as brutal an axe. As these months went by and he stayed, I spent less time jerking away at night, searching for his form beside me, and more curling up in the bends and folds of him as he slept, tucking his arm around my waist.

  Trust wasn’t something given freely, and it was taking time to know each other’s habits, to get used to the fact that we were together and weren’t pa
rting any time soon … an upgrade to our relationship I’d never expected. Were we perfect? Of course not. We fought about ludicrous things like who used the last of the toothpaste and what the chances were of a Saxon assassin finding me and exacting Gordon’s revenge. Usually things not reserved for normal, average, happy couples.

  The Theo I’d known and crafted in my head during those missing years was constantly planning, organizing, betting and on the move. This guy, however, spent all his time with me, relaxed and easy save for calls like these that flipped him back to the man he was.

  But, we were healing together. Or trying to.

  “Okay. Thanks,” Theo said, then clicked off.

  “Well?” I asked as he approached, the phone hanging loose in his hand.

  “There’s likely a plea deal with my father. Ten years.”

  “That’s it?” I rubbed my hands on my knees, expelling nervous energy.

  “More than I thought,” Theo said. “As for Trace … I’m sure he’ll also work out a deal.”

  “Damn,” I muttered.

  “We can do this,” Theo said, massaging my neck. “Whatever happens, I’ll keep you out of danger.”

  “Now that I’ve honed my abilities to avoiding villainous situations rather than running to them, I’m doing pretty good on that, too,” I said.

  He smiled. “I do appreciate the foresight you had in creating your own account in the Cayman’s.”

  I popped a grape into my mouth and savored the juice popping over my tongue. “The government didn’t deserve all my winnings. Still, it’s a pittance compared to yours.”

  Theo kept that ingenue grin on his face. “We’re comfortable.”

  I used that moment to glance at his watch. “Shit,” I said and jumped up. “We’re going to be late.”

  “I don’t think this place operates like the city you’re used to,” Theo called behind me, but I ignored him, pulled on a light sundress, finger-combed my hair, then grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the hut.

  * * *

  When we got to the hospital, my pulse was noticeably pounding against my wrists. Theo rubbed at the sensitive spot underneath one of my palms, providing tickling reassurance.