“You're not bringing any hurt to us,” I said.“This psycho is.He was targeting us before you got here.”
Anchor nodded.“We were already in this long before we found your picture.Bernice, the bodies—this is our problem.You’re just…”
“Collateral damage?More of the problem?”she suggested.
I felt my jaw clench.“No,” I said.“You’re not a problem.”
She lifted her eyes to mine.
“You’re under our roof.That makes you ours to protect.”
Something flickered in her gaze.
It was small.
But I saw it.
Anchor pushed off the table.“You’re staying until we figure out why he wants you.That’s not up for debate.In the meantime, you don’t leave that back hallway without one of us with you.Not to the kitchen.Not to the bathroom.Not to the front porch.Nowhere.”
Her mouth dropped open.“I’m on house arrest?”
“Consider it very aggressive witness protection,” Anchor said.“You can do what you want, just one of us has to be with you.It will be Prime most of the time, but if he can’t, you don’t do anything unless you’ve got someone with a patch next to you.”
“I’m not helpless,” she argued.
“Never said you were,” I said quietly.
She went still.
“You might remember more,” I added.“About the island.About that night.About your mother.About whatever the hell might connect that night to this psycho.”It really was a stretch.The odds that twenty-some years ago Shay had seen something, and that this guy was coming after her because of it was way out in left field, but honestly, everything that had been happening was way out of left field.
“I don’t want to remember,” she whispered.“It might get me killed if I do.”
“Doesn’t matter what you want,” I said.“Whatever happened that night could lead us right to this guy.”
Her throat bobbed like she was swallowing glass.“You say that like it’s supposed to make me feel better,” she said.
“It should,” I said.“Because whether you like it or not, you’ve got a whole club between you and him now.”
“Why do you care?”she asked suddenly.
The question hit harder than it should have.
Because I’d been asking myself the same damn thing since I walked into that grocery store, saw her behind the register with her name badge on, and felt something in my chest go tight.
“I don’t like predators,” I said.“And I don’t like someone thinking they can use a woman to screw with my club.”
“That’s it?”she asked, eyes searching my face like she knew there was more.
“That’s enough,” I said.
Anchor checked the clock on the wall.“I’m gonna go check the west perimeter and then head back to the cabin.Pearl might swing by if I let her.In the meantime, Prime’s on you.”
She blinked.“On me?”
I answered, “I don’t leave this room unless you do.Remember that?”
“I do, but I’m not going to like it,” she said.
