Bound Forever

by Hanna Peach

  Bound Forever (Bound #2)

  By Hanna Peach

  The stunning conclusion to Bound by Lies…

  “Kitten”

  Caden and I on the run. Together. But he still won’t let me touch him and I know he is still keeping things from me. I am determined to uncover everything − at any cost. Even if it tears us apart.

  Caden

  Jacob is back. He’s back and he knows about her. Now everything that binds the three of us together is twisting and tightening, pulling us all together. I can feel the inevitable coming…

  I don’t know how this will end… all I know is, there will be blood.

  Adult romantic suspense. +18 years.

  “In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”

  ~ Albert Camus

  For invincible summers.

  Prologue

  “Did you miss me?” he whispers. And I fight a shiver.

  Snake shoves me into the car. He gets in behind me and Jacob gets in beside me, forcing me to the middle of the back seat. I am squashed in between the devil and the snake.

  As the last car door is shut, the noise from outside disappears and suddenly I feel like I’m underwater.

  Jacob leans in and tucks a lock of hair behind my ears. My skin burns at his poisonous touch and I flinch away from him. He grabs my chin and forces my head to one side so he can whisper into my ear. “You took away the one thing I loved. Now I’m going to take away yours.”

  Through the window I see Garfield pushing Caden down to the ground on all fours. Even from here Caden looks defeated. His tied hands clutch the dirt as he watches the car I’m in drive away. His mouth is open in a scream. Garfield kicks him to one side and our eye contact is broken.

  Now Caden is in profile as Garfield steps around him, putting them face to face. He raises his gun to Caden’s chest. Everything goes still and slow.

  This isn’t happening. I feel like I’m watching a movie from the frame of the car window. It’s not real. It can’t be. If this were a movie this is when the cops would show up. Or Mick. Or someone…

  But this isn’t the movies. The sound of my heartbeat thuds in my ears low and slow.

  Glub, glub.

  My heart swells with so much helpless fear it’s about to burst. In my head I’m begging him, No, Garfield. You’re a good man. Please. No.

  But Garfield pulls the trigger. His hand recoils slightly from the shot. Caden jolts as if he has been electrocuted. A spray of blood spits out from Caden’s back and I swear I can see where the bullet has cut its deadly line across his heart. My own heart explodes with pain as if Garfield has shot me too.

  Caden is frozen, held up for the tiniest of moments, shock clear in the profile of his face. Then he falls forward.

  My Caden. My love. Falls into the dirt. Dead.

  Chapter One

  Seven days earlier…

  Blood splatter soaks through the backs of my eyelids. I snap my eyes open with a gasp. I become aware of my body, my curled and twisted limbs, and feel the ground rolling along underneath me. Somehow the cursed strap has found its way to press upon my throat, choking me. I’m trapped within the passenger seat of our getaway car.

  Our getaway car.

  Caden −

  − and I.

  That sentence should feel wonderful, but it doesn’t. It is separate, like we are. Divided, on either side of the law, on either side of this invisible line.

  Based on the daylight crowding out the insides of the car I estimate it’s only mid-morning. Which means we must have only been on the road for a few hours now.

  “You’re awake,” Caden’s voice rumbles to me, causing my heart to patter. I curse it for reacting to his voice the way it does.

  I look over to him. At the same time he takes his eyes off the road and catches my eyes holding them for a second. I take him all in. All of him.

  Most people would look at Caden and see danger. You can see it in his sheer width; his jaw, his shoulders, chest, arms, everything tight and coiled with a dormant power. His thick lips hide a row of straight white teeth. His large and rough-looking hands, now clutching the steering wheel, could so easily wrap around my throat. His piercing dark green eyes, so thick with lashes you would swear he lined the rims with kohl. Those eyes watch me. They don’t miss when the pulse in my neck speeds up, when my breath hitches or when my eyes widen almost imperceptibly. Most of all you can see danger in that jagged scar that cuts right across his left eyebrow. It tells you he doesn’t walk away from a fight. But because it’s his only scar, it says that he always wins. See… deadly. That’s what you thought, isn’t it?

  I see these things too. But for some strange reason I see my safety. I feel it radiating out from him when I’m near. His width is my shield, his arms that wrap all the way around me are my shelter, his mouth a balm that smooths across my every ache, even the ones no one can see. He protects me. But who protects me from him?

  I break eye contact and look away. I can’t stand to look at him any longer. It hurts too much. I go to rub my eyes, but my left hand is caught on something that clinks. I frown as I look down. A pair of silver cuffs chain my wrist to the side of the seat.

  Muthafucker.

  “What the hell, Caden?”

  I can see a smirk playing at the corner of his lips. “To make sure you don’t run. I didn’t think you’d let me put them on you while you were awake so…”

  My mouth drops open. “I am not going to sit here cuffed like some kind of criminal. Undo them right now.”

  “Nope.”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  I start tugging furiously at the seat with both hands. I’m going to break these damn things off if it’s the last thing I−

  “Stop that.”

  “Let me go then.”

  “Not a chance. You’re in my custody. Under my protection. The cuffs stay.”

  “I don’t want your goddamn protection.” Liar. “Let me go right this minute or I’ll scream.”

  “No one can hear you, sweetheart.”

  “Except for you.” I inhale, lean forward and let out all my frustration into a long, loud scream right into his ear.

  I can hear Caden cursing over my banshee shrieking. He jerks away, his right shoulder coming up to try to block his eardrum from my assault.

  He swerves the car and I’m thrown back into my seat, the rest of my scream lodging in my throat. He brakes hard at the side of the road. I fly forward and I think I’m going to hit the dashboard. But his arm is there to hold me back, protecting me.

  Dust flies around the car, fogging up the windows in a burnt orange haze.

  “Jesus, Caden, what the−”

  He grabs my face with his hand, shutting me up. His fingers dig into my flesh firmly but not enough to hurt. “You listen here and listen good.” He glares at me. “You are getting my protection whether you like it or not and I’m keeping you safe even if it God damn kills me. I’ll do so however I see fit. If I see fit to handcuff you to the seat, which I do by the way, I will handcuff you to the goddamn seat. And you will sit there and you will shut up and you will accept it. You got that?”

  A lump develops in my chest right where my traitor heart sits and I struggle to breathe around it. For a moment, as I gaze into his eyes, shiny with emotion, I could swear that he cares about me more than just a job. I could swear it. I nod my head as much as I can while being trapped in his hand.

  His features soften and I become too aware of how close our faces are and how his eyes have found my mouth. I don’t dare move. He swallows and his fingers loosen. I swear my skin is so sensitized to his touch I can feel the loops and whirls of his fingerprints on my skin. I fight a shiver.

&n
bsp; “Are you hurt?” he asks as he glances over me.

  “I’m okay.”

  “Are you going to behave?”

  “Maybe. Are you going to take these cuffs off me?”

  “No.”

  There is no point arguing with him. I slump back in my seat, crossing my arms as best as I can with one handcuffed to the seat. “Don’t think you’ve won, Caden Thaine.”

  He snorts. “Never. I know I can’t win with you.”

  What the hell is that supposed to mean?

  He pulls the car onto the road and we’re off again. I glare at the rushing landscape outside my window, cursing every tree and every shrub that flies past us. I glance at the clock on the dashboard. It’s just past nine, which means that only hours ago, Caden and I were dumping a body in the river after I had shot dead a man who worked for Jacob Tyrell, the man I’m running from. I had to kill him. I swear. I had no choice. He would have taken us to Jacob if I didn’t, which would have meant a very painful death. Him or me. You would have done the same if you were me.

  It still doesn’t make the guilt go away completely. It lies there underneath the surface like a stain that has sunk into the depths of a carpet.

  Jesus, was that only earlier this morning?

  A few hours before that, Caden had abducted me from my boss, Dixie’s, apartment. Or should I say, old boss. I can’t go back to work for her anymore.

  And a few hours before that, I had stumbled into a drug smuggling operation owned by the Tyrells and found Caden amongst them.

  Did that all really happen in less than twelve hours? How everything can change in just one day…

  Caden clears his throat. “Did you sleep okay?”

  “Why do you care?” I hear him growl and quickly I add, “Yeh, I slept okay.” Sleep was beautiful. Peaceful. Sleep is the only reprise from my life.

  “Good.” He taps on the steering wheel in an off beat. “Good.”

  I rub my arms as if I’m trying to rub off the awkwardness that sits around Caden and me. It feels weird and I hate it. I don’t know what has caused it.

  No, I lie. I do know.

  I remember Caden’s admission last night. He’s a police officer working undercover. He found me so he could find Jacob. I’m a job. And he’s part of the system I hate. Part of the very system that screwed me over in the first place.

  You see, when I ran for the very first time, I didn’t run away… I ran to the police. They told me they would protect me. They told me they would arrest Jacob and put him behind bars where he couldn’t hurt me or anyone else anymore. They told me that if I testified, they would put him away for life.

  They lied.

  Chapter Two

  Three years ago…

  For the last two years my grandparents and I have been in the witness protection program. We were moved to a secret location and given a backstory and a new home to live in. I had to leave college without letting anyone know the real reason why. All my friends, my home, everything I knew, I had to leave behind.

  The shell of a life I was forced to leave behind was just that… a shell. At least that’s what I tried to tell myself. It may have been a thin, translucent ghost of a life, but at least it was mine and it was real.

  After I promised to testify against Jacob, the police went after him with a warrant. But when they got to his apartment, Jacob was already gone. Someone had tipped him off. They should have twigged that someone in their ranks was working for him. They should have known that I wasn’t really safe.

  Which brings us to today… two years later and my grandmamma handing me the phone receiver with a worried look on her face. My blood rushes to my ears in a pounding sound. Only a few people have this number.

  I clutch the phone to my ear. “H-hello?”

  The sound of Senior Detective Moore’s voice comes on the line. “We found Jacob. He’s in custody now. It’s over.”

  It’s over. The sound of these two words bounce around my brain cavity like a pinball. I let go of the phone and it falls to the floor with a clatter. I slide to the ground and cry openly, tears rolling down my cheeks and through my fingers. My grandmamma rushes to my side, shushing at me, as my grandpa picks up the phone and demands to know what the hell the detective said to me.

  It’s over.

  After almost two years. After seven hundred and twenty-three days, seven hundred and twenty-three restless nights, seven hundred and twenty-three mornings when I wake up and am reminded of the hell I’ve put myself in, of living with another name, of waking up to the smallest sound and jumping every time the phone rings. Of feeling like a fraud, hollow inside and wearing this fake mask of this fake identity over me like an ill-fitting coat, suspended in the purgatory of my bad decisions… it’s over. Jacob has been caught.

  Jacob’s trial is expedited. Soon I’m being escorted by police from my “home” for the last two years to a safehouse. My grandparents want to come but the detectives say that I have to go alone.

  I can tell my grandmamma is trying hard not to cry when she hugs me. She fusses over my hair and my collar and shoots instructions to the two officers who have come to collect me. “Make sure she stays warm, I don’t want her staying up too late watching TV…”

  I watch them nod at her, caught somewhere between wanting to reassure and an embarrassment at being given such stern demands by a woman twice their age and a third of their weight.

  Before I can get into the car, my grandpa pulls me into his arms and grips me with a fierceness that steals my breath away. In my ear he whispers, “In the depths of winter, you will finally learn within you lays an invincible summer.” It’s a variant on a quote by Albert Camus.

  I leave my grandmamma and my grandpa behind holding their terse brave faces. I watch them disappear out the back tinted window of this black sedan as this car turns the corner of the street and I get the worst feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  I spend that night in a safehouse on the outskirts of the city I left behind two years ago. The shadows of the tree outside of this house make dark slashes across the ceiling of this bedroom. I just try to take comfort from the sound of the television from the living room next door, where the two officers who have been assigned to me are. I’m being protected but I don’t feel safe.

  Tonight, I can’t sleep. But this isn’t unusual for me. I just keep thinking over and over again about tomorrow. About the moment I’ll see Jacob again. God help me. I’m scared I’ll break. I’m scared that I won’t be able to speak or I’ll cry so hard that I become a useless witness. But most of all, I’m terrified that one soft look from him will set my heart alight. I’m scared that I won’t want to put him away for life, even after all he has done to me. I’m terrified out of my mind that I won’t be able to go through with it, even though I have to. I just have to. My heart clenches with an almost unbearable pain. For the first time in years I start to pray. Dear God, please don’t let me still love that monster.

  The morning slowly steals the night away and it’s finally the day of Jacob’s trial. I move through my morning routine like I’m sleepwalking. It takes me longer than usual to button up my shirt because my fingers are shaking and I can’t stop them. I barely take two bites of the cereal someone has poured into a bowl for me at the breakfast table. I feel sick. And I’ve chewed my nails down to ugly stumps.

  The car taking me from the safehouse to the courthouse is a black sedan with tinted windows. Even though I know that my face can’t be seen from the outside I still shrink away from the windows. I sit in the middle seat in the back, chewing on my lip, staring at the sprawl of suburbia rolling by us.

  My two federal escorts are sitting in the front two seats, making me feel almost like a criminal back here by myself. Lt. Gareth Smith is driving. Stevie, or Lt. Steven Oswald, is in the front passenger seat. These two couldn’t look more different. Gary is taller and he’s as dark as night with a neatly trimmed beard. His voice is soft spoken and he insists on calling me madam.

  Stev
ie has a shaved head and thick chest and a hint of ink that flashes from under the collar of his shirt. He has a thick rough accent that betrays his southern upbringing. “Can you drive any slower, Gary? I think the seniors’ brigade is beating you down the street.”

  “I’m following the speed limit. The law, Stevie. Remember that thing you swore to uphold?”

  Stevie snorts. “We’re not even on the main highway yet. I should have driven. We would be halfway there already.”

  “Having broken how many traffic laws?”

  “We’re cops. Traffic laws… traffic suggestions… Whatever. We can get around them.”

  “Jesus, you worry me sometimes.”

  “Your inability to chill the hell out worries me. Let’s swap. I’ll drive.”

  “No. I won the coin toss this morning. So I get to drive and you get to shut up.”

  “Nana driver. We’d get there faster if we walked.”

  “Why don’t you get out and walk then.”

  “Why don’t you get out and walk?” Stevie reaches out to fiddle with the radio buttons.

  Gary whips out a hand to stop him. “Na ah, you don’t ever mess with a black man’s tunes.” I only notice then that the radio is playing a commercial R&B song. “I won that coin toss, too, remember?”

  “But this is a soppy-ass love song. We need something with a bit of rock in it to get us in the mood.” Stevie reaches out again.

  “Touch the radio and I’ll break your fingers.”

  “But the−”

  “Leave it.”

  “Just−”

  “Brother, do not make me Taser your ass.”

  Stevie growls and slumps back into his seat. “Shoot me now and put me out of my misery.”

  “Gladly. But it would cause me too much paperwork.”

  “I swear, Gary, you get less and less fun every day. Isn’t the missus givin’ you enough at home?”

  Gary doesn’t respond to the obvious bait. The silence catches my attention and I look up just in time to catch Gary’s furrowed brow as he glances up into the rearview mirror.