But I shook my head, the pain zinging in my neck. “Tell me…who are you?”
The dark cloud woman stared at me, the heartbreak in her eyes difficult to look at.
“I’m Gianna,” she whispered shakily.
I blinked at her, the name swirling inside me. Gianna. Yes. Yes, that rang a bell. “Why’re you sorry?” I rasped, feeling my energy draining with every word. “Who did you…tell?”
Gianna said nothing. She looked me over with her sad eyes until, suddenly, she dropped her face in her hands andbawled.I’d seen her tears before—many times. Yes, it was all slow inside my head, but I’d experienced it all before, but never like this. She’d never been so full of sorrow.
“I didn’t—” she gasped, her face red and blotchy. “I didn’t know he was going to do this!” Her fingers clutched my hand again, wet from her tears. “He told me you kidnapped her again, and I—” Gianna was stumbling over her own sobs, trembling from head to toe.
He.Who was he? Unable to move, I watched Gianna cry, feeling afraid. Afraid that she would tell me something bad.
Something bad about Jade.
Because why was Gianna here if Jade was the one who lived in my mind? If Jade was the one I loved…why wasn’t she here? Was she…gone?
“Who? What did you tell? To who?”
“Xavier!” Gianna almost shouted the name, visibly annoyed with my inability to understand. “I told him where you were! I didn’t know he was going to do this!” she assured me, her eyes wide. “He called me late at night andpleaded.He cried! He said you tookheragain, and he was worried about her! He said you got into a fight, and he was worried you were going to hurt her! So he asked—”
Gianna wailed, half falling onto my bed, but I could only focus on one name.
Xavier.
One time, Xavier smashed my face into a wall. He grabbed my hair and then he just—sort of, I don’t know…flung me into the nearest wall.
My mind was slow and gooey, but I forced myself to concentrate. Jade’s voice echoed inside my head while Gianna cried in front of me, her tears so familiar.
“I told him! Because I still knew. I didn’t check the app anymore, but I also couldn’ttellyou that I still knew where you were!” Gianna waved her hands in front of her face, as if imploring herself. “And then he wouldn’t pick up the phone! He blocked me! And I panicked! That’s how I found you—I came to the last place where your location showed up—ohGod!”
Gianna jumped up from the chair and began pacing the little room I was in. I watched her, my fear growing.
It was all so heavy, but dark memories began to take shape in my mind. Yes. Gianna played a role in my life, not significant,but negative. Xavier, too, was a disjointed memory, but he was inJade’slife. It must have been the man who hurt her. The man she told me about.
“Wh-where’s Jade?”
At this question, Gianna halted mid-step. She dropped her head back and sighed, as if the name personally offended her.
“I don’t know. I found you at the motel, and I called the ambulance. No one else was there,” Gianna said, cold and detached, albeit still sniffling.
“He took her? Xav-Xavier?” I choked out, panic rising in my body from lack of clarity and no answers. Was Jade in danger? Was she with the man who hurt her? With Xavier?
Gianna turned to me then, her chin trembling and suchhurtin her eyes.
“Xavier nearly beat you to death, Alex. And Jade wasn’t there when I found you. So yes, I’m going to assume she’s with him.”
There was darkness all around me once more, like it descended out of nowhere, but this time, there were no soft memories of Jade. Only her voice—crying. Begging someone to let me go.
45
Miami
Roman
Isla, my beautiful, gorgeous, sexy, mesmerizing wife, was almost seven months pregnant, and this was our last chance to take a trip. She wanted to go somewhere warm—obviously—so when Alex called, we flew to Miami.
Isla had never been, so while she was tanning her pregnant belly on the beach, I took a seat at the beachfront café and waited for my friend.
