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My pool cue clattered to the table as I practically tossed it there. The others looked back at me in surprise.
“Wetoldyou this!” Evan shot back. “You were the one who said she needed her space! You were the one who—”
“I know, I know” I cut him off. “And I waswrong. Dead wrong to believe she’d be safe by herself.” I let out my next breath as a long, heated hiss. “We can’t leave her alone. Not now. Not with the lives of both her and our child at stake.”
“And you’re willing to go against her wishes?” Cole asked casually.
“We need to find her. We need to bring her here—”
“Because this isn’t what she wants,” Evan piled on. “It’s actually the opposite of what she wants.”
“To hell with what she wants,” I grunted. “She doesn’t know the whole story. She doesn’t know the bigger picture.”
“Possibly because we haven’t shown it to her,” Cole interjected flatly.
For the moment, I shoved his sarcasm aside. It didn’t help that he was right.
“At worst we’ll be a big intrusive pain in her ass,” I reasoned. “But if we’renotwrong, and there’s an actual danger…”
Three high-pitched beeps in rapid succession caused us to all look at each other. The screens around us blinked on, and a black-and-white image faded in of a car approaching the front gate. It was sharply contrasted in high definition, even at night.
“Forget about going to get her,” Cole grunted, his sharp blue eyes scanning the monitors. “Looks like she’s here.”
Ten
QUINN
The late-night ride was solemn and silent, but I really needed to wind down. I’d passed from Boston’s big city lights into the busy outskirts, down through Chelsea and Revere. The northern suburbs gave way to open highway, winding up past Salem and beyond Manchester by the Sea.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I got to this place. But I needed answers, and I needed them tonight if not yesterday. There were only three people in the world who could provide them. Three men sharing a single address somewhere on the coast, near Ipswich Bay.
And if they were sleeping, too damned bad.
Eventually I exited and the road sloped downward, growing ever more desolate as it wound its way to the sea. With my window down and the cool ocean air blowing in, I could actually taste it. The flavor was salty yet welcoming. At times, even sweet.
It made perfect sense that they’d live all the way out here. Despite how tight-knit they obviously were, my three pseudo-stalkers gave off serious loner vibes. Like they’d gotten tired of being around companies and battalions and whatever the hell else they’d spent the last decade of their lives immersed in, before military life finally spat them out, changed in ways that were always permanent.
The piece of paper in my pocket hadn’t given a date or time, just a place. And that place was now looming before me: a tremendous, almost mansion-looking structure rising up like a shadow against the moonlit sea.
Holy shit…
The double gate mounted just ahead was constructed of dark iron, thick and heavy. By the time my car reached it however, it had automatically swung open on silent hinges.
There were lights on in the house. That encouraged me. As freakishly big as the compound was — and it wasdefinitelya compound, I could see that now — the warm glow emanating from beyond the windows seemed to soften the harsh edges and sharp features of the immense, stone facade.
I passed through a secondary gate, and into a walled-off courtyard paved with flagstones. Slowly I rolled up next to a pair of oversized trucks, killed the engine, and took a long, deep breath.
Well, you’re here.
Yeah, I guess I was. The spacious courtyard seemed unnaturally silent. It should’ve felt a little eerie in the spectral moonlight, but for some reason it didn’t. Maybe because the cold stone walls surrounding me made me feel oddly safe.
I stepped out, and walked straight up to a pair of formidable front doors. Just like the gates, they were open before I even got there.
All three men stood in the doorway, in various states of casual, bedtime undress. Joshua and Cole wore sweats and T-shirts; on anyone else they might’ve looked plain, but stretched tightly across their musclebound frames they looked obscenely hot. I did my best to ignore the obvious eye candy, even as I tried not to stare at Evan’s gorgeously-ripped, tattooed arms. The sleeveless workout shirt he had on made his shoulders pop like a pair of sexy boulders.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
Joshua’s handsome mouth was curled into something resembling a smile. If I were in the mood for it, it might even be charming. I noticed he was still wearing the necklace — or whatever it was — he’d sported on both of our ‘dates.’ It looked like a worn, five-sided piece of curled up leather, on a piece of string around his neck.
