Raw (Revenge Book 6)

by Trevion Burns

  Linc tried to speak as his own eyes filled across the room, but he couldn’t. He tried to move, but his knees were locked in place. He tried to blink, but his eyes wouldn’t dare relinquish the sight of her, not even for a fraction of a second.

  Silence.

  His breathing moved to panting as he drank in her face, still exactly as he remembered, as beautiful and delicate as a porcelain doll.

  Her pointed nostrils flared, and with a strangled cry, Lisa dropped her clutch bag and broke into a run, her face crumbling as she closed the space between them in two long, desperate strides before launching into his arms.

  Linc caught her, his own tortured cry racing up his throat as she slung her arms around his neck, locking his own arms around her tiny waist, sealing their bodies together. A sob rolled through her body like a seismic wave, warming the crook of his neck as she found herself encased in his embrace.

  Body trembling with tears that grew more powerful by the second, Lisa squeezed his neck as hard as she could, so tightly she nearly cut off circulation.

  But Linc didn’t care.

  Breathing was secondary. Breathing didn’t matter. All that mattered was having her in his arms.

  He’d breathe his last before ever losing her again.

  ——

  When Gage opened the door to his home across town, it was approaching midnight. The house sat atop one of the highest cliffs in Shadow Rock, and the sound of ocean waves rolling at its base invited itself inside as he stepped into the foyer. Earlier that night, after forgetting all about her threat to never have sex with him again, Veda had given him her beautiful body on the teacher’s desk, a student’s desk, and up against the window of the classroom. After cleaning themselves up and returning to the prom—where the kids had thankfully survived their extended absence—they hadn’t been able to help smiling at each other whenever they’d locked eyes across the gym.

  He hadn’t been able to stop the tent in his pants that had begged for round two.

  But there couldn’t be a round two.

  Not yet.

  He sighed as he closed the door behind him, peeling his burgundy suit jacket off his arms, shoes clicking as he made his way across the foyer.

  “Good evening, dearest husband. How was your cruise?”

  Gage slowed to a stop halfway toward the grand staircase, under the foyer’s crystal chandelier, its small white lights bouncing against the white stone columns that soared to the second level. Looking into the dining area, he caught sight of Scarlett, wearing a fitted red dress just a few shades brighter than her hair. She slouched low in a dining chair with her legs propped up on the white marble table, feet crossed at the ankle, as she bopped one of her black high heeled feet. She cradled a glass of red wine under lazy fingers, a half empty bottle sitting in the middle of the table, her big blue eyes expanding as Gage made his way toward her.

  “Not dearest husband, just yet,” he said, suit jacket hanging from one hand while he loosened his bow tie with the other. “We’ve still got—”

  “Four weeks, six days, twelve hours, and twenty-seven minutes,” Scarlett finished for him, her hoarse voice echoing through the vaulted ceilings as it rose. “Why Gage? Why?”

  He stopped a few feet away from her chair, blinking slowly. “How much have you had to drink?”

  Scarlett slammed her wine glass down on the table and stood, wobbling the moment she did, proving she’d had plenty to drink while waiting for her “dear husband” to return home from his month-long cruise.

  She moved to him, her teeth softly baring, even as her eyes remained wide and innocent, jabbing a manicured finger into his chest. “Whatever your plan is… fast-track it. I’m talking right now…” She pointed to the floor. “I’m talking tonight.”

  “What plan, Scarlett? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Bullshit. You’re just as sick to your stomach over the idea of our upcoming nuptials as I am. How do I know that? Well, while you were cruisin’, livin’ it up in Hawaii and Australia, I sat down to dinner with our lovely parents. And after that dinner, I overheard a conversation between our fathers in the family study. They know everything, Gage. They know you were caught poking around down at the bottom of the ship, sticking your nose where it didn’t belong…”

  Gage’s face fell, feeling every inch of color drain from his cheeks.

  Scarlett must’ve seen how white he’d become because she nodded. “Yep.”

  “But Eugene said—”

  “That he was just keeping it between the two of you?” She jabbed a finger into his chest again. “Nope.” She came to her toes, her merlot scented breath warming his lips, voice falling to a whisper. “You got straight played, homie.”

  Gage’s eyes narrowed, then widened. His father knew everything?

  Everything?

  “So before you get the uncomfortable phone call from your father informing you that you’re no longer an employee at his cruise line… I decided to take matters into my own hands and came up with a little plan of my own. Kevin Brady, the guard who pointed a gun at you?” She paused to slither her hands down her body, doing a little shimmy as she did. “He wants this.”

  Gage followed her hands as she caressed her own body—his eyebrows raised high. “He wants that, Scarlett?”

  She bared her teeth and pinched her eyebrows, a look Gage assumed was meant to be seductive. “Oh, he wants all of this. Begging for it since grade school. And considering I find him repulsive in every conceivable way, I’ve turned down his advances every time. But I won’t turn him down tonight.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Oh, yes, tonight. Tonight I’m gonna accompany you down to that fucking ship, and we’re gonna mosey on down to the same hull where Kevin put a gun to your head. I’m going to lure him away…” She ran her hands down her body again, doing another little sway. “With all of this, and you’ll be free to find whatever the hell it was you were looking for down there in the first place. Because I know the only reason you agreed to sign that contract—the only reason you conceded to this nauseating sham of an engagement—was to get your hands on whatever it is you believe is hidden at the bottom of that ship. So tonight, you’re going to get it. And then you’re going to tell your father to go fuck himself sideways, render that contract null and void, and release us both from this—” She shoved him with all her might. “Hell that you’ve gotten us into.”

  Gage barely stumbled at her push. He covered his mouth with his hand, hiding his smiling lips for a moment before motioning to her, changing the subject completely. “Hey, have you ever been out to a club, cocktail in hand, so drunk off your ass that you couldn’t even manage to get the straw inside your mouth? You open your mouth as wide as it’ll go, but somehow, you just can’t get the damn thing between your drunken lips? So, instead, you try to take a sip straight from the glass, miss the rim, and spill the drink all over yourself? Yeah, that’s exactly how I imagine things going if you even attempt to suck Kevin Brady’s dick tonight.”

  “I’ve never heard so many vile words leave your mouth. If I weren’t crazy, I’d almost mistake you for a man.” Her knees wobbled. “Man the fuck up, Blackwater!”

  Gage readied himself to catch her when she appeared on the verge of falling, sighing when she steadied herself just in time. “You can barely stand on your own two feet right now. You’re in no condition to seduce anyone, let alone carry out some covert operation that you haven’t even fully thought through.”

  “Right! Because you’re so cunning and crafty,” she beamed, holding her pale, slim arms out at her sides with a laugh. “The guy who got caught the first night the cruise set sail. You’re totally in a position to judge my swindling skills. At least I have a fucking vagina. That alone gives me better odds than you. That’s the kind of leverage you can’t top, son.”

  Gage nearly laughed. “You’d honestly sleep with some guy you don’t even like, just to help me?”

  “Neither of us wants this wed
ding, and if whatever’s at the bottom of that ship is what’s going to get you to put an end to all of this, then I’ll fuck forty men if I have to. I just want to go back to my old life, my old house, and my old boyfriend, Juan, so I can screw him—the man I really want—in peace.”

  Gage chortled but sobered in the next instant. He considered her from the corners of his eyes. “Go upstairs and lay down. Get some sleep, get that red wine out of your system, and we’ll talk about this when you wake up tomorrow.”

  Her eyes expanded in excitement, clearly believing she’d convinced him, and then she nodded rapidly.

  “Let’s go,” Gage moved away while nodding towards the stairs, silently inviting her to follow.

  “So we’re doing this, right?” Scarlett asked, following close behind him as they pounded up the grand staircase, holding the rails to keep her wobbling knees from collapsing under her. “We’re doing this?”

  Gage didn’t answer. Not because he didn’t have the answer, but because he was afraid of how badly he wanted to say yes. If Scarlett was right, and Kevin Brady was stupid enough to leave his post for a piece of ass, Gage could finish this madness in a matter of minutes.

  By morning, he could have Veda in his arms again. His ring back on her finger. His child on its way into a world that wasn’t darkened with secrets and lies.

  The need to say yes nearly ate him alive.

  But Scarlett was trashed, and as Gage peeked over his shoulder at her, leading her into the guest bedroom where she’d get some much-needed sleep, he knew he couldn’t make a decision until she sobered up.

  25

  After cornering Lisa minutes earlier, the tips of Linc’s fingers remained on her tanned knees, as he studied her face from his seat on the edge of the coffee table in the hotel room’s living area. As he took her in, sitting on the white sofa directly across from him, he wondered if he’d ever have the heart to take his hands off her again.

  A glass of water that Sam had poured trembled in Lisa’s fingers, and she kept her head down, avoiding everyone’s gaze—Sam’s, Lieutenant Chavez’s, and even Linc’s.

  Linc’s fingers shook as well as he caressed her knees, silently pleading for her eyes, still unable to believe that it was her soft skin under the beds of his fingers. Her blue eyes that he begged for—that he waited with baited breath for. Tears pricked his own eyes, and when Lisa finally looked up, shyly meeting his gaze, he could see the same moisture pricking at hers.

  “Listen, Lisa.” Sam sat next to Lisa on the couch, waiting for her to break her eyes from Linc’s. “We know you’ve been through a lot, and we’re not here to bust you. We need you to help us nail the bastards running this operation.”

  Lisa swallowed thickly, peeking a look at Linc from the corner of her eyes. Her brunette hair perfectly matched the deep, dark mascara that surrounded both her blue irises, the contrast making her orbs look almost completely gray.

  Linc tightened his hold on her knees and frowned softly, licking his lips, wanting nothing more than to lean in and taste hers for the first time in five years. To suck her bottom lip between his. Then her top. To wrap her in his arms and never let go. To fix everything they’d lost. To make her feel safe again. Because he could see in her eyes that she didn’t.

  He felt Chavez’s gaze burning into the back of his head, and Linc knew he was seconds from being thrown out of that room just for touching Lisa the way he was. Kissing was definitely out of the question. So he maintained control as best he could.

  “Don’t be afraid.” Linc spoke to the fear he saw in Lisa’s eyes. “Lisa, I’m never gonna let anything happen to you again. We have witness protection. We’ll relocate. I’ll protect you. But you’ve gotta talk to me, baby.” He took the glass of water shaking in her grasp and set it on the coffee table before engulfing her manicured hands in his. “Tell me what happened the day you disappeared.”

  Lisa squeezed his hands.

  Being a detective in SVU had given Linc years of experience dragging the truth out of terrified women, so he already knew what Lisa was about to say.

  She was about to say, ‘They’ll kill me.’

  So when she said, “They’ll kill her,” instead, a cold chill ran down his spine. To drive it home, Lisa said it again, voice trembling. “They’ll kill her if they find out I’m talking to the police. You have to let me go.”

  Linc’s eyes expanded and then shrank, chest heaving as he shook his head.

  Lisa’s teeth began to chatter as she watched the confusion filling his eyes. “We have a daughter.”

  The air left Linc’s lungs.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Sam’s chest rise too before hiding her face in her hands.

  Linc flinched, speechless, the lump in his throat making it impossible to respond.

  A tear jetted down Lisa’s chiseled cheek. “She almost five. Her name is Emma. And they will kill her. They’ll kill our baby without a moment’s hesitation. Without a blink of their eye.”

  Linc exhaled heavily, his voice shattered. “Where?”

  Lisa shook her head. Appearing to realize Linc would never understand, her vulnerable eyes moved between Sam and Lieutenant Chavez, begging. She must’ve seen the same thing in their eyes as she saw in Linc’s because she looked back to him.

  “They don’t let me see her often,” Lisa said. “They’re constantly moving her around. Last time I saw her was a year ago. God only knows where they’ve taken her since then.”

  “Lisa, you need to tell us everything you know,” Sam demanded.

  Lisa snapped her eyes to her, voice rising. “I can’t. Did you not just hear a word I said? They’ll kill my baby.”

  “And if you don’t talk to us, you’re going to jail,” Chavez said, claiming Lisa’s attention. “We don’t want that, Lisa. Do you?”

  Lisa exhaled sharply before leaning forward and reaching for her clutch bag, which sat on the table next to Linc. Her sudden movement caused everyone in the room to jolt, including Linc, whose hand flew out, landing heavily on Lisa’s the moment she got hold of the bag, stopping her.

  Their eyes met, green on blue, neither able to decide which one of them looked more shocked at his reaction.

  Swallowing thickly, Lisa removed her hand from the bag and sat tall. “I just want my phone.”

  Linc’s chest heaved as he searched her eyes. A moment later, he picked up the bag and popped it open, fishing out the cell phone and handing it to Lisa.

  She took it and immediately began tapping on the screen, sniffling the whole time. A moment later, she turned the screen toward Linc, phone shaking under her grip.

  Linc’s gaze fell to the screen, and the moment the photo of a child with gapped teeth, rosy cheeks, big green eyes, and a head full of wild blonde curls hit his eyes, it took everything in him not to scream. Every emotion hit him at once, and every one of them was debilitating—the love, the need, the white-hot anger. They filled him to the brim in seconds, sending his body into overdrive, hurtling it toward the brink of explosion.

  Lisa studied Linc’s reaction, phone still trembling in her hands. “I always thought she looked like Grace.”

  Linc slammed his eyes closed as the first tear fell down his cheek, hiding his face in his hand and heaving out a crackling breath. It had been the first thought to cross his mind too, the moment he’d laid eyes on that photo. That the little girl smiling into the camera was his mother’s spitting image.

  Sensing Linc’s slow and inevitable collapse, Chavez’s voice petered in, softer this time. “Lisa, we can help you save Emma, but—”

  “No, you can’t.” Lisa’s eyes blazed up to Lieutenant Chavez before she could finish, dropping the phone into her lap, speaking through clenched teeth. “That’s a lie, and you know it.” Her gaze flew around the room, teeth bared. “This is worldwide. This is bigger than you. It’s bigger than all of us. You’ll never find my daughter. All you’re going to do is get her killed!”

  “So we don’t even try?” Sam asked. “We
don’t do everything we can, at least?” She faltered, choosing her words more carefully now that the tone in the room had shifted. “The two men who walked in with you earlier tonight… they’re still downstairs. They think we’re up here spending the night together. They have no idea we’re cops unless you’ve somehow given them a heads up.”

  “You honestly think I would ever be on their side?” Lisa asked, with a sarcastic grin. “The people who abducted me? Raped me? Degraded me? The people who took my daughter and only let me see her at their leisure? You think I would alert them to the fact that I’ve laid eyes on her father for the first time in five years? On my husband?”

  Sam took a moment. “I don’t know, Lisa. I don’t know anything. That’s the problem. What could it hurt just to tell us everything you know? Why don’t we start with the day you went missing?”

  Lisa’s eyes flew back and forth between Sam and Linc, who now watched her with a hand over his downturned lips. Lisa licked her own lips, forced her eyes closed, and then let a long moment pass.

  “I remember not even wanting to get on that miserable cruise ship,” Lisa said softly, reclaiming Linc’s eyes. “After your vacation request was denied, I didn’t even want to go anymore. But I did. And I’ve spent every single day of the last five years wishing I’d made a different decision. But I didn’t, and now I have our daughter to think about.”

  “How did it happen, Lisa?” Linc tried to speak calmly, even as the vision of that beautiful little girl with big blonde curls was still lighting fire to his brain.

  “I don’t know,” Lisa whispered. “The last thing I remember was going to bed in my suite. When I woke up… I was chained, hungry, and beaten half to death. It’s a miracle our baby survived.”

  “Where did they take you?” Sam asked.

  “I don’t know where they first took me, but since then… I’ve been all over the world. Wherever the money is—that’s where I go.”

  “And Raw Moon?” Sam asked.