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And I knew he wouldn’t do that.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” I hedged.
“You promised never to lie to me, Cain,” Ethan said softly. “And while that wasn’t exactly a lie, it wasn’t the truth either.”
I sighed and said, “If our only choice is to eliminate Eric, your name will never be cleared.”
“I’ll have to disappear,” he whispered. “Hide for the rest of my life.” His eyes shifted away from me. “But Lucy would be safe, right?”
“She’d be safe. The state would likely try to find a relative to take her in. If they can’t, she’d have to go into foster care.”
“They wouldn’t let my family have her, would they?”
“No,” I admitted. “Probably not.”
Ethan rolled onto his side, away from me. “She’d be safe, though,” he murmured.
“Whatever happens, Ethan,” I said as I rolled him back on to his back. “You’ll both be safe and you can still have a life. You can still practice medicine. Ronan can make that happen for you.”
“But I won’t get to be me anymore,” he said.
“No, you won’t.”
He nodded, but his expression was solemn.
“Talk to me, Ethan,” I said softly as I saw him checking out mentally.
He shook his head. “I…I’ll sound so ungrateful,” he said quietly. “And I’m not, I’m really not.”
“I know that. It’s okay, you can tell me.”
He closed his eyes for a moment before saying, “I was just thinking that he’ll still win. Even if he no longer walks this earth, I’m still his prisoner…it’ll be like I never escaped. I’ll still lose everything I was trying to get back.”
I leaned down and brushed my mouth over his. “The phone’s going to work, Ethan. I know it.” He started to open his mouth to speak, but I cut him off with another kiss. “That’s not a lie. I know it in here,” I said as I used my hand to tap my chest. “It’s going to work and you’re going to be able to go home again.”
Ethan studied me for a long time before nodding, and then his arms were around my neck as he pulled me down into his embrace. I wrapped my arms around him and just held him until the tension eased out of him and he said, “Feed me or I’m going to fight you for the leftover pizza.”
I laughed and said, “Okay, but you’re going to have to let me go first.”
Ethan didn’t loosen his hold on me. Instead he said, “Never mind.”
I chuckled at that and gave him exactly what he wanted…no, what he needed.
Chapter Fourteen
Ethan
I wasn’t someone who typically resorted to stereotypes to define people, but admittedly, when Cain had told me we were going to meet the man Ronan had tasked with fixing Lucy’s phone, I’d imagined a tall, young, thin, geeky guy with glasses and an eager beaver personality.
I got the tall part right, but that was as far as it went in describing Vincent St. James.
First off, the man was in his late forties and there was nothing geeky about him. With his short silver hair with just a few strands of darker hair here and there and a body that rivaled any man’s half his age, he was the epitome of a silver fox. He was taller than Cain which probably put him near the 6’5 mark and he had tattoos covering both biceps and more sneaking out beneath the collar of his shirt. If I hadn’t already been in complete and utter lust with the man at my side, I definitely would have looked twice at Vincent and several times after that, too.
There was nothing eager beaver about Vincent either. He was cold and aloof as Cain introduced us and he made no effort to shake either of our hands, which for Cain’s sake, I was glad for.
The man had ended up meeting us at a small house deep in the George Washington and Jefferson National Forest in West Virginia. He hadn’t said if the house was his or not and we hadn’t asked as he’d let us inside. Nor had he offered us any kind of food or beverage as he’d led us to the kitchen and accepted the envelope containing Lucy’s phone.
“Do you have the passcode for it?” Vincent asked without looking up from the phone. His eyes were examining the cracked screen.
“Yes,” I said.
He slid a pen and small pad of paper across the island to me and I quickly jotted down the code.
“Did it power on at all after it was dropped?” he asked.
“No,” I responded. “We tried plugging it in but it seemed like it wasn’t charging.”
Vincent nodded and then looked up at us. “I’ll need a few days with it…if I need to order parts, might be longer. If you’re staying in the area, there’s a hotel about ten miles from here. It’s open during the off season.” His gaze shifted to Cain. “It’ll be pretty quiet.”
