Lyra, this isn't fucking funny anymore. Where the hell are you?
I slam my phone onto the passenger seat, knuckles white against the wood-trim steering wheel. It's been two fucking weeks since Lyra disappeared.
Fourteen days. Twelve missed calls and just as many unanswered texts. On top of that, two voicemails, something I never leave for anyone.
My mind replays the night she vanished. The way she looked past me, distracted. Her bullshit excuse about a family emergency. The obvious lie in her eyes.
She's missed two fights and one of my guys got an infection because the replacement medic was a fucking joke. Cost me a fighter and one hundred and eleven grand in the process.
But that's not why I'm hunting her down like this. That's not why I can barely sleep, why I find myself checking my phone for a text that won't come.
At first, I tell myself she is just being dramatic. Maybe she needed space. That kiss stirred shit up. I figured she'd come back with that fire in her eyes.
But she doesn't.
And every day she stays gone, the irritation in my chest turns to something worse.
Worry.
A feeling I don't fucking like.
I send a guy to her apartment. I have him knock. No answer.
"Wait a day," I say. "Then park your ass out front and stay there. I want to know the second she walks back through that door."
And my lack of sleep is starting to show. I've been snapping at my fighters, barking at Callum. Even Keira clocked me two nights ago at dinner.
"You look like shit, Dec," she says, sipping her wine. "And you're acting moody this week, too."
"Fuck off."
"Jesus. It's the nurse, isn't it? It's got to be a woman."
I don't answer. But I don't deny it, either.
Now it's Thursday night. Another tournament. The fights are on. The warehouse is packed.
And I don't want to go inside.
I go between worry, anger and fear. It's fucking brutal and I hate it. I want to hate her for doing this, but I can't. In truth, I just want her to be okay. Even if I never see her again, I just want to know she's safe.
"Goddammit!" I yell, picking up my phone and getting out of the car. As I walk toward the entrance door, my phone rings.
It's Henry, the man I stationed outside her place.
"Yeah."
"Sir, she's back."
I stop dead in my tracks.
"What?"
"She's here, sir. Just walked inside."
"You sure?" I ask, turning and walking fast back to my car.
"Yes."
