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Very unconscious.
“Help me with him,” she said, crouching down and grabbing his ankles.
I admit, I kind of stood there like a confused tool.
“Don’t just stand there, help me.”
I stared at the woman who only seconds earlier had a gun pressed into my spine.
She looked at me again, and when she saw the emotion on my face, she stood up. “We need to get him inside and then go and get my brother.”
“Before I do anything, I want to know what I’m walking into. Will Alex hurt Noah?” I asked.
If he did, I would hunt him down and kill him.
“Not a chance. He’s family. And if there is one cardinal rule that Alex lives by, it’s that family doesn’t hurt family. That’s the only reason I’m not dead.” Her eyes met mine. Her face stiff with emotion. At least the kid wasn’t going to be harmed. “But it doesn’t mean he won’t take him away so I can never find him.”
“Fine.” I crouched down and lifted the front of Jean-Paul’s shirt. “Let’s get this asshole inside your apartment and then pay Alex a visit.”
Inside, she disappeared into her bedroom, then returned with something in her hands.
“Here.” She threw a set of handcuffs at me. “Put these on him.”
I stared at the cuffs. “Why am I even surprised?”
While Taylor shoved a few items into a backpack, I secured the cuffs around Jean-Paul’s wrists. He was out cold.
“What are you going to do with him?” I asked.
“We’re taking him with us. Alex has my brother. But now I’ve got Martel’s son, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want him to catch a bullet in his skull.”
Her words were cold and sharp, like the edge of a knife blade. And I was still stunned that the woman I thought I knew, thought I loved, was even capable of doing such a thing.
I was no saint. But I had thought she was an angel.
Turned out she was just as dark as me.
I didn’t know if it scared the hell out of me.
Or if it turned me on.
Either way, I didn’t have the time to think about it. We had to get Noah back, and time was running out.
I rose to my feet. “That’s the best plan you’ve got? Swapsies?”
She gave me a pointed look. “It’s the only one I’ve got. Unless you have a better one?”
“Not at the moment.”
“Then that’s the one we’re going with.”
She crossed the room and removed two bulletproof vests from the closet, throwing one in my direction.
“Really?” I asked, shaking my head. “Your little secret is the gift that just keeps on giving, isn’t it?”
“Put it on,” she said, already securing hers to her torso.
I did as she said, and then picked up my gun from the table.
Taylor looked from it to me. “That thing is loaded, right?”
I cocked an eyebrow at her.
“Good,” she said. “Because you’re going to need it.”
TAYLOR
Bull drove while I sat in the passenger seat and stared out the window.
I was about to face my past, and it was about time. Because today it ended.
All the fear.
The pain.
All the looking over my shoulder.
I thought back to when the cards were put into play.
After Alex killed Jacob, he sent me to Cabo for a week with one of his bodyguards as protection. I wasn’t stupid. David wasn’t just there to look after me, he was there to keep an eye on me. And the vacation was a distraction. Alex knew I was cracking. Knew I had seen beneath his mask. He was angry at me. But he wasn’t ready to let me go, not while I was still so useful to him. He had invested a lot of time in me, so he sent me away to have a good time, hoping I would forget.
Because seeing your godfather put a bullet in your best friend’s head was so easy to forget.
So off to Cabo David and I went.
For five days I used denial as a coping mechanism. I pretended my life was different. I sank into a make-believe world where I didn’t kill people for a living, and where the people I loved didn’t die.
I lay on the beach and soaked up the sun, drinking enough tequila to make me numb.
I swam in the crystal waters and ate luscious tropical fruit at sunset, followed by more alcohol to make me even more numb.
David was a good vacation buddy. He wasn’t a robot like a lot of Alex’s men were. Away from the testosterone overload and masculine bravado of Alex’s criminal world, he was fun, adventurous, even humorous.
And the fact that he looked like a Greek god, helped me mentally separate him from the suit-wearing, fierce bodyguard he was back at home. On that beach he was someone else. Someone just like me who didn’t kill people for Alex.
We had one night together. One hot, sweaty night that meant nothing. But it was fun and exciting, and the orgasms were mind-blowing.
