Chapter 118
-Hailey-
The scream that tore out of me felt like it flayed the skin in my throat.
It was the only part of the dream that made it across the border into the waking world, and it sent Logan shooting up out of a dead sleep.
“Hailey?!” His voice was a gravelly roar, tired but instantly awake.
His body jackknifed beside me, and his arms locked around me before my eyes were even fully open. I’d been thrashing. My limbs were tangled in the sweaty sheets, and the phantom bite of zip–ties was still burning my wrists.
“Ace, look at me. Look at me… I’m here. You’re here. It was a dream.”
I was sobbing. Huge, heaving gulps of air that caught and hitched on the memory of the duct tape.
I collapsed against him and my fingers dug into the hard muscles of his back, needing to feel that he was solid, that he was warm, that the horrifying wound across his throat was just a phantom pain in my own.
“Logan,” I choked out in a broken rasp. “Your… your neck…”
His hands came up, one cupping the back of my head while the other stroked down my spine in a rough, steady rhythm. “It’s fine. I’m fine. It was a dream, baby. Just a fuckin‘ nightmare. Breathe.”
He held me against his chest, and I pressed my ear to his skin, listening frantically for the beat of his heart. It was there. It was real. The rhythm started to slowly override the horrifying *plink, plink, plink* of his dream–blood dripping onto hardwood.
The details of the room seeped back in. The familiar blankets. The scent of us overlaying the scent of Anatoly’s cologne.
–
sex, lavender, whiskey, and leather-
The deep darkness, broken by the white moonlight seeping in through the window.
I was shaking. Tremors wracked my body that I couldn’t control. Logan just held me tighter, resting his chin on the top of my head. He didn’t ask what the dream was about. He just held me through the aftershocks. A silent, immovable rock against my panic.
Slowly, agonizingly, my breathing evened out. The images started to recede from HD clarity to a grainy, nightmare filmstrip I could almost tuck away. Almost.
“Jesus,” I whispered into his skin. My voice was still unsteady. “It was so real.”
“I know,” he murmured. His hand continued its slow, soothing path up and down my back. “Gets me too, sometimes. After Benny. After… other shit.”
The trust in his voice and the raw concern
–
–
to purge the poison Anatoly had left in my head.
caused a physical ache. The confession welled up in me, in a desperate need
*He threatened Mom and Abby. He said he’d kill you if I told you.*
The words were right there on my tongue.
I pulled back just enough to look at his face in the dim light. His green eyes – alive. So brilliantly, beautifully alive — were searching mine, etched with worry.
1/3
3:02 pm p
PM
Chapter 18
This was my chance. To share the burden. To let the blunt instrument do what it did best.
My mouth opened. I took a breath
And I saw it. Not the dream Logan, but the real one. I saw him strapping on his weapons, with the new VP patch gleaming like a bullseye on his chest.
I saw him gathering the brothers, leading a charge based on my words. Kiding straight into the complex, elegant trap that Anatoly would undoubtedly have waiting.
I saw him falling. His living, searching green eyes going glassy and still. Just like in my dream.
The words died in my throat.
“It was the house,” I lied. “The body. The… the pliers. It all just got jumbled up. It wasn’t entirely a lie. It just wasn’t the whole, terrifying truth.
He studied my face, and I worried he could see the lie written in the pulse hammering in my veins.
But after a heartbeat, he just nodded and pulled me back against him. “It’s over,” he said, low and certain. “You’re safe.”
He held me until my shaking stopped completely, until my breathing finally synced with his.
The adrenaline crash was a lead weight pulling me down.
His own exhaustion knocked him out again, and his arms loosened their grip. His body went heavier against mine, and within minutes, his breathing deepened into the steady rhythm of sleep.
But I was wide awake.
The fear hadn’t left… it had just changed form. It had cooled from a blazing panic into a hard, icy diamond of dread in the pit of my stomach.
I was alone with it again. The sole keeper of a secret that felt like a live grenade with the pin pulled.
Carefully, so carefully, I extracted myself from his arms. He murmured something in his sleep but didn’t wake up. I reached for my phone where it lay on the nightstand.
The screen glowed to life at my touch, insanely bright in the dark room. I blinked against it, and my heart kicked back into a frantic rhythm.
My thumbs trembled as I pulled up my contacts and found Stella’s name. Her number.
His number now.
My mind raced as I composed and deleted messages.
* Leave them alone. *
Too pleading. It showed fear.
I didn’t tell him. *
Too weak. It showed I was obeying.
If you touch them I’ll kill you myself.
2/3
8:02 pm p p P M
Chapter 118
A hollow threat. He would laugh.
What do you want?
The most dangerous question of all.
My thumb hovered over the send button each time, and my stomach lurched. I deleted the words every time. Engaging with him was exactly what he wanted. It was playing his game on his board.
But the paralyzing fear of doing nothing, of just waiting for his next move, was even worse.
Tears of frustration and sheer exhaustion welled in my eyes, blurring the screen. I was trapped. Every path led to a nightmare.
The energy drained out of me all at once, leaving me empty and trembling. The emotional whiplash of the day–the rescue, the confrontation, the sex, the nightmare – finally crashed down. My eyelids got heavy.
The phone stayed clutched in my hand, with my thumb resting on Stella’s name. A dead man’s switch.
The last thing I felt before sleep dragged me under again was Logan’s arm finding me, hooking over my hip and pulling me back against his chest.
3/3
Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
