Page 39 of Honest Neglect

“I have,” he replied. “And we all used our skills to help out with some serious missions after we retired. You’re a good solider, Warren; you still have a lot of it in you. You’d do well with us.”

I pondered it for a moment. There was a time when I would have jumped at the chance to do something like that, to use all the skills I had, to develop and put them to some use, but now...now, I didn’t feel the same urge. I didn’t need to find a purpose in my life because I had one—making sure I kept Lily safe.

“I’ll think about it,” I replied.

“There’s no rush,” he remarked. “This case will be a long time in the courts, and you’ll be tied up in that giving evidence for a while.”

“I want to propose to Lily when all of this is done,” I told him. The words caught me slightly off-guard, but they were true—I wanted to marry her. Seeing her in the state she had been in after the attack from her ex and knowing how scared she was that I was just going to up and leave her the first chance I got, I needed to make a big statement to show her how serious I was about sticking around. I wasn’t going to leave her. I couldn’t even imagine it. I adored her, and my priority when this was done was to put down real roots with her in this place and help her begin to heal from what she had endured.

Leroy smiled. I didn’t see him smile much, but it was clear he had a soft spot for Lily, maybe because of how fond his wife had been of her.

“She’s an impressive girl,” he remarked. “You’ll be lucky to have her.”

“I know,” I agreed, grinning. I still couldn’t believe how much luck had been on my side to have had her crash into my life the way she did. When I thought of her, all of this made sense to me—all of it was worth it. I would have done anything it took to protect her, but beyond that, I wanted to see her thrive in her normal, day-to-day life. I couldn’t wait to share that with her.

Leroy finished his drink and went to the bathroom, and I headed back out to the car. Just before I reached it, though, a voice stopped me dead in my tracks.

“You really think you can just bring down my empire like that?”

I spun around. There, leaning against the car opposite Leroy’s, was Mark McCarthy. There was a grin on his face that looked half-crazy and a gun in his hand, resting against his leg.

And I was suddenly faced with the realization that none of this was over. Not yet.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Lily

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SILVER TROTTED BEHIND me as I paced back and forth in the living room, stealing glances toward the window every few steps.

How long was he going to make me wait? Warren had promised me that their little search for Mark wasn’t going to take long, but it had been hours now, and there was still no sign of him. I needed to find out where he was, what was going on. Had they run into Mark and taken him in? Or had something...darker happened?

Mom had gone to bed, leaving just me and Silver in the house. I felt oddly exposed here, even though I knew I was safe. Mark wouldn’t come to this place right after Tony had been arrested here; he wasn’t that stupid. And besides, I had Silver here to protect me. I needed to remember that. Just because Tony had come here and tried to intimidate us didn’t mean his calculating father was going to be so stupid.

But that had just raised more questions in my mind about what he might have done instead. What if he had run into Warren and done something to him? Warren had been so sure that everything was going to be okay, what if he hadn’t been paying the same attention he was before? What if he got hurt...?

There had been no sign of Leroy or Warren, and I had promised myself I would wait till nine before I started calling around. I counted down the minutes until we got there and then snatched up the phone and called up the number Leroy had left us to contact his men if we needed them.

Within a few rings, Leroy had answered. The sound of his voice had me breathing a sigh of relief.

“Leroy, what’s going on?” I asked him after he’d greeted me. “I thought you and Warren would be back by now...”

“Warren’s not with you?” he replied, surprised. My heart dropped.

“I thought he was with you,” I exclaimed. “I...what happened? Where did you last see him? Where are you right now?”

“I’m with my men in a lodge outside town,” he replied. “Warren and I stopped at a bar for a drink after we’d scoped out Oakville, and he got to talking about you—when I came back from the bathroom and he was gone, I thought he had just gone home to you.”

I felt like I was going to throw up. No, I couldn’t handle this. I couldn’t lose him, not Warren. Leroy had taken his eye off the ball for a moment, and now we didn’t know where he was, what might have been happening to him. I needed to get to him. I needed to find him.

“What was the name of the bar you were at with him?” I asked urgently, grabbing a pen from the coffee table. Silver was looking up at me with concern, her brown eyes deep with worry. She could always tell when there was something wrong, and heaven only knew we had been through plenty of wrongness over the last few weeks.

Leroy told me the name of the bar, and I scribbled it down on the back of my hand. There weren’t many places to drink in Oakville, but I would scope out each and every one myself if I had to. There had to be a clue there as to where Warren had ended up, though I already had a good idea of who he might be with.

“I’m going there now,” I told him, grabbing my coat.

“You can’t go alone,” Leroy warned me. “I’ll send down one of my men to help you out. Don’t go in until you’re with someone, okay?”