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“Yeah, baby, I’m here.”
I froze.
That voice sounded as if he was right in front of me. Right… It was then that I became fully aware of warm palms against my cheeks, thumbs caressing the skin underneath my eyes.
“Open your eyes,” he instructed in that demanding voice I loved so much.
I didn’t do it right away. Instead, I reached for him, climbed in his body, folded myself in his arms and buried my face in the safest place I knew, his neck. I inhaled, and I swear all the darkness fell away. I was acutely aware of someone crying in the background. The voice of an angry Ayana talking about stringing someone up by their balls and Brad saying, “Not unless I get to him first.”Wait what?
More sounds hit my ears and one of my worst fears had seemed to come true, yet a-freaking-gain. I had a panic attack in public. God, someone kill me now!
A comforting hand caressed my back, soothingly. Oh, it felt so good. It made me forget my embarrassment, but it also allowed the fear to creep back in.
“Someone was in my room,” I said against his neck.
His hold tightened.
“Yeah, baby, I know.”
He pulled back, and I reluctantly came up for oxygen that wasn’t filled with of the scent of Lock, and met his concerned eyes.
“Hey, beautiful,” he whispered for only me to hear. My cheeks curled slightly from the warm tone and gentleness coming from him. “You’re safe now. Whoever it was is gone. But you can best believe I will find him.”
“Not before I find his ass, first. Fucking son of a bitch!”
That was Ayana again.
Lock rolled his eyes and for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, I allowed myself to relax, and I smiled. That was, until my eyes fell on a very pissed off Reed Watson.
Rut-Roh,I said to myself, in my best Scooby-Doo voice.
“IF A RELATIONSHIP IS ULTIMATELY BASED ON LOVE, EVERYTHING IS WORTH ONE MORE TRY” - UNKNOWN
CHAPTER4
LOCK
This fucking crime scene was so far in the shitter, I wasn’t sure how it could be cleaned up. The only saving grace was that this wasn’t completely our case. Well, I take that back: the on-going threat to Phoebe’s life was our case, but the two bodies two doors down from her hotel room wasn’t our case. And thank fuck, because it was a clusterfuck of epic proportions, and it had everything to do with Reed, motherfucking, Watson.
I stood in the lobby, off in the corner of Phoebe’s hotel, listening to Ivey give me his report on the condition of Phoebe’s room. My eyes drifted to the woman in question, surrounded by an extremely pissed off Ayana and a solemn, yet frightened Noelle. My brother was over there too, checking Phoebe’s vitals, making sure she was at least physically okay.
“There was no forced entry, so whoever broke in used a key card. The room is trashed. Her clothes are everywhere, destroyed with bleach, urine.”
My eyebrows rose to my forehead, and I brought questioning eyes to my second in command.
“Urine? The fucker pissed on her clothes?”
“Yes, but the team thinks we won’t get a good sample since everything is mixed with bleach. They did take samples anyway, so we’ll see. I gotta say, the shit is every fucking where. It’s going to be hell trying to clean that room.”
“What else? Did you lift any prints? Anything useful?”
“No. We think he was lying in wait, though. He wrote on the wall where the TV used to be, warning that he would be back for her and thattheywouldn’t be there to save her next time. I’m assumingtheymeant the two poor souls in the room a few doors down from Miss Gates or he could’ve been talking about Ayana and Noelle.”
I grunted in agreement and glanced back at the trio.
“It’s crazy how she sensed danger,” Ivey surmised. “A good thing too. No telling what could have happened here.”
I grunted again. He wasn’t lying about that. I knew my sister-in-law. She carried a gun on her no matter where she went and wouldn’t hesitate to pull it out when she felt threatened. If whomever was waiting for them had a weapon, too. Fuck, it could have been far worse than three scared people. And two dead bodies. Speaking of…
