AllFreeNovel
Share Us
1
Eve
Ifeel the rumble beneath me before my eyes open.
It takes me a moment to process that I’m not at home in my bed. That I’m not even lying down. I’m sitting up in the back of a car, and I have the worst pain in my neck. When I roll my head on my shoulders, I wince, squeezing my eyes closed even tighter.
Then, I smell Luka.
For a moment, the familiar scent of his cologne calms me. He is nearby. We are together.
The knot in my chest loosens, and I realize that everything else will be okay as long as we are together.
“Finally awake?”
My eyes snap open at the unfamiliar voice, and I smash my body against the car door, putting as much distance between myself and my seatmate as possible. The car is dark, only the small lights from the car’s console offering a small glow of light into the back seat, and I have to find the human shape in the blackness piece by piece.
“Sorry to startle you,” she says. It is a ‘she’ I recognize now, but I’m still not sure who she is.
Definitely not Luka.
“Where am I?” My voice is raspy, and I clear my throat. “Who are you?”
The woman tilts her head to the side, her long blonde ponytail falling over her shoulder. “You don’t remember?”
I shake my head slowly. My entire body is tense, on guard. I have no memory of how I got here, and a quick glance around the car tells me that, aside from the driver, we are alone. “Where is my family?”
The woman leans forward and looks into my face like she is studying me for signs of injury. “You don’t remember me, Eve?”
It is still dark, but as she moves closer, I see her blonde hair and crisp business clothes. I remember what Luka told me.
“You are … Cole’s sister?” It is a guess, but now that I really look at her, I can see the similarities in their eyes.
“Rian,” she nods.
I shake my head. This still doesn’t make any sense. Even during the short time I was engaged to Cole Morrison, Rian was never around. I didn’t even know she existed until Luka told me he’d met her earlier in the night.
When was that? Just a few hours ago? Talking to him after he came home from the FBI headquarters is one of the last things I remember, but clearly there is a large gap in my memory. How many hours have I lost?
And where is my husband?
Working for the FBI probably meant Rian couldn’t socialize with a known gun trafficker, even if he was her brother. Cole didn’t feel the need to mention she existed. Maybe I would have learned about her eventually if I’d stuck around and become his wife. But apparently they were closer than I realized if she was willing to use her authority as an FBI agent to hunt down the man responsible for her brother’s death.
“I’m sure you are confused,” she says, reaching out to lay a hand on my arm.
I pull away from her reach, and then feel bad for doing so. What if she really is trying to help me?
My head is still swimming. Nothing is making any sense.
She presses her lips together and folds her hands in her lap. “We came to your house to talk with your husband.”
“We?” I ask, looking towards the driver.
She digs in her pocket and pulls out her FBI badge.
“Is he in trouble? You already talked to him tonight. What is going on?”
“Just business,” she says sharply. Then, her eyes soften. “While we were there the second time, you went into a kind of … fit.”
