The dawn is coming through the frosted glass of the bathroom window, and it’s my cue to get out and get on the road. I have a new life to start, a new town to try to make mine, until he finds me again. He did it twice now, and I know he doesn’t plan to stop, and that’s the cross I bear, because I chose to climb in bed with the enemy.

  Chapter Eight

  Kellan

  Pulling up to the last known address Shayla provided me, I enter the building and make my way up the elevator. It’s not in the best part of Seattle, but it’s not the worse I’ve seen. However, no matter how much my woman broke my heart, she sure as shit shouldn’t have been living here, in this shit hole. I grit my teeth and clench my fist at my side at the thought of her living in a place this dangerous.

  But it all adds to the mystery of whatever happened. I have no idea what’s going on, but I’m starting to see hope that she didn’t leave me because she didn’t love me, but because she was running from something or someone. I always told her I knew she had secrets, and she always laughed it off. But those secrets caught up to her, and I know that the second I approach her door just outside the elevator. It’s busted open, and I can see her place has been ransacked. Reaching around to my back, I pull my gun from my waist and step in slowly. I don’t know if someone is still there or what I’m going to stumble upon, but I’m always prepared.

  I’m a few steps in and can see almost every part of her tiny studio apartment, everything but the bathroom. When I check the kitchen and living area is clear, I slowly draw closer to the slightly agape bathroom door. My blood boils. Seeing her place destroyed has me more determined to find her. My woman is in trouble, and in that second, when the bathroom is clear and she is nowhere to be found, I feel her in my chest.

  I grip it, because I feel I may pass out. It thuds so hard it nearly explodes from me, and I know it’s because of her. She needs me; she’s crying out for me and I need to fucking get her. Her scent is all around me and I take it in, trying to calm myself and put my game face on. It is vital I find her and do it fast, because each second could be the one in which I lose her, and I make it my mission in a room surrounded by her things that I will hunt her down and never let her leave me again. I refuse to let her slip away again.

  “I’ll find you, Mercy. I promise, baby.”

  “Nico, I need your help.” Driving to my parents’ house, I call the only man I know who can help me with this. When I called him and told him the story of who Mercy was and how the hell this ended up in my lap, he was just as at a loss for words as I was.

  “Hey, son, what’s going on?”sHis deep voice booms through the Bluetooth in my truck.

  “I’m worried. Something isn’t right. I need to pull all my resources and put out as many feelers as I can.” My heart hasn’t stopped beating erratically since I left Mercy’s place. I grabbed some things that could lead me to her, but whoever ransacked her place could have taken the same types of things, and that has them on my level. And I sure as hell refuse to let them have an advantage.

  “Anything you need. What can I do?”

  “She’s running. I don’t think they have her yet. In fact, I know they don’t.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  I shake my head, biting my bottom lip as I grip the steering wheel to the point it may dissolve under my white knuckles.

  “Nico, I can’t explain it, but I feel it. I can feel her, and she’s safe for now, but I know it won’t be long. I know that sounds crazy, but I can feel her.”

  He’s quiet for a minute, and nothing comes out of his mouth for a brief pause.

  “No it isn’t. It’s not crazy. When you’re connected to the love of your life, you just know. I have that with Soph. Give me her name, phone number, and anything you have. Credit card information? Social? Anything. I will look into it on my end.”

  I release a deep breath, knowing he will be the only one to understand all this. Him and my parents. They share that connection, the one I built with Mercy, and no one will ever get it but those who have found it. It’s that boom thing they’re always talking about.

  “I’ll get it to you. But you have to call the second you find something. I’m going to pull all my contacts in the surrounding states.” Nico did this for longer then I did, and he has more connections than I do, including the entire police force of Nashville.

  “I will, but there’s one thing you need to know, son, and your dad will say the same thing. You have to keep your mind in it. I know you love this woman, and I know you want to find her, but you have to be one step ahead of whoever is trying to beat you to her. You have to. Because the second they get one step ahead, that’s the second you will lose and these fuckers will destroy all you have. Don’t get lost, Kellan. Keep. Your. Shit. Right. This is your woman, and you can’t let them take her from you. Got it?”

  “Yeah, I do. You’re right. Thank you, Nico.”

  “Anytime, now send me that information and we will follow up first thing tomorrow.”

  I pull up my parents’ house, behind my father’s cruiser, and finish up my call.

  “Will do. See ya, man.”

  As I end the call, my mother steps out onto the porch and I take a deep breath, reining it in and following Nico’s orders. And I’m about to tell my parents everything. They knew of Mercy, but they never knew how deep my love for her was. “Hey, Mama.” Climbing down from my truck, my feet hit the gravel of their driveway.

  “Oh no, that’s never a good tone. Come in and sit. I’m just about done cooking dinner. You can talk to your dad and me. He’s just finishing up his shower.”

  I give her a gentle smile. I’m exhausted and lost. Trying to keep my mind right is a battle, because I just want my girl in my arms.

  I meet my mother at the front door and greet her with a kiss on the cheek.

  “Sounds good. I need it.”

  The worry brews wild in her eyes and I hate that I’m dumping this on them, which I usually never would, but I really need everyone I know in on this and helping me. My father is a police officer, and I know he can look into her as well. I didn’t tell Shayla and them that, because I just wanted to get out and find Mercy. But all my outlets and resources will be used, and I will stretch as far and wide as I can to make sure she is found.

  “I bet. What’s going on?” she asks.

  We make our way to the kitchen, and I grab a beer from their fridge and plop down at the table. My mother resumes her place at the stove, finishing up her infamous shrimp gumbo. The smell of food wakes up my stomach. I’ve barely touched food in the past three days, searching everywhere around town for Mercy. Every hotel, every alley, and every damn nook and cranny. My stomach finally tells me I need fucking fuel.

  “Long story. Can we eat first and let me get in a beer or two?” I run my hand down my face, the five o’ clock shadow coming in and scraping against it. I’m exhausted.

  “We can, but you better believe your butt will be sleeping here tonight. You aren’t driving after drinking.” She gives me that same look she’s given me since I was a kid. Her “try me” look.

  I let out a small chuckle. “Yeah, I plan to.”

  “Good. Now come grab a bowl. I just heard the shower turn off,” she orders. Standing, I come behind her and place my chin on her shoulder. She reaches behind her and turns her head slightly, giving me a kiss on the cheek. “Whatever is bringing you to your knees, we will fix it, baby. I promise.”

  “I hope so, Mama. I’m not right, right now.”

  She turns and cups my face. “Son, what is going on? Is it that woman? Is everything okay? Should I be worried?”

  I look at her beautiful eyes, soft and kind, and I release it all. “Yes. I never told you guys everything about the woman I fell in love with a few years ago.”

  I see the sadness lingering in the back of her emotional eyes, but she doesn’t mention anything about me hiding something as big as falling in love.

  But that was who Mercy and I were. When we fell in love, we lived in a bubble and I didn’t want to share her. I knew she had secrets, and it made it much more important to me to shelter her and keep her feeling safe. Part of that meant not telling my parents about her until we ended things, and that was the extent. I told them I was dating a girl and it didn’t end well. I left the rest out.

  “Who is she, and why are you broken up over her if you love her so much then, sweet boy?”

  “You’re in love?” My father announces his presence at the tale end of our conversation.

  “He is, and I think the shrimp gumbo is going to be a little spicier tonight. Sit down, boys, and I will make us some bowls.”

  “I’m going to get a beer. Want another one, son?” My dad pats my back as I move toward the kitchen table.

  “Yeah, please,” I respond. I really have no idea how I will even start this damn story, but I have to try, because for the first time as a grown man near his thirties, I need my parents. I need as much solace and advice as I can find right now. Nothing makes sense anymore.

  Mercy and I were different than any relationship I have seen or known. We had this world we made just for one another. We kept our relationship private, we lived in a bubble, and even though we knew so much about each other, I knew she had a secret she didn’t want to tell. I assumed it was why she and her parents didn’t talk, or maybe she had a few bad relationships, but now I know it was so much more deeper than that.

  The puzzle as to why she left me is starting to piece together, and I am completely and utterly at a loss. I won’t lie; I can’t tell my head from my ass right now.

  I’m mad she hid it from me, yet I hurt that she kept it all to herself and fought alone. I’m angry to find her, because of the way she left and broke my fucking heart, but I can’t wait to find her again and touch her. To fucking touch my woman again. I don’t know what to do, and the only thing I have left is to fall to my knees and beg for everyone in my life to help me. Help me save my woman—help me find my girl.

  “All right, boy, what’s going on?” Dad interrupts the silence other than our eating.

  We didn’t talk for the first few minutes we sat down. My parents have always known I’m the type to work things out and open up in the way that is best for me.

  “I don’t even know where to start. But I guess I can try to make it all make sense.” I take a sip of my beer and keep my eyes focused on the table under me.

  “That’s all you can do, son,” my mom agrees.

  “A few years ago, I met Mercy at a bar,”

  “Mercy? What a beautiful, unique name,” my mother interrupts, and my dad coughs in his throat.

  “Babe, we gotta let him talk.”

  My parents saw me after we ended things, and I told them I was with a woman and it didn’t work out. I said she broke my heart and I didn’t want to talk anymore about it. They never even knew her name. That’s how fucking damaged I was—am—since Mercy left me.

  “Sorry. Yes, go on, handsome.” She touches my arm.

  “Anyway, I met her, and I swear to God it was like that boom thing Uncle Nico is always talking about. I just knew she was meant to be mine. She had these eyes that I could see across the room, and her laugh drew me in.” I chuckle at the memory. “She even gave me sass and called my bluff the night we met. She didn’t fall for me like all the other girls I dated before.”

  I feel my heart rate increasing with the influx of memories pouring in, but I hold myself together.

  “Then it was a whirlwind. I couldn’t stay away from her, and we couldn’t get enough of each other, and this need and feeling overcame me. I wanted to keep her to myself. She made me feel things I couldn’t understand, and I fell into that. I trusted it and I gave her everything. Everything.” I take a deep breath, and I swear I feel her here, reaching in my chest and squeezing my heart.

  “After a few months, I knew she was it, and even though I knew she was a mystery and had things she was afraid to tell me, I still trusted she was the one, so I did it. I bought a ring and I asked her to marry me.” The pain from that night hits, and that grip on my chest she holds completely closes and my heart shatters.

  “You asked her to marry you?” My mother’s eyes well with tears, and this is the part I was worried about. I knew hiding this would be one thing, but telling her I fell that deeply in love, enough to marry Mercy, and didn’t involve my mother would be devastating for her.

  “I did and, Mom, Dad, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but it’s different with her, and it’s starting to come together. I know you may be mad at me and you may not understand, but I need as many people to understand what’s going on as possible.”

  My dad nods, rubbing soothing circles on my mother’s back, and I grab her hand, consoling her. Being adopted created a deeper connection with my parents than I think I ever would’ve had with my birth parents. And with that deep connection comes deeper emotions.

  I don’t draw attention to her tears any more than I already have, so I continue.

  “She said yes.”

  “Oh, honey,” my mother says through her tears.

  “Then she left me. She said yes, we celebrated it, fell asleep together, and I woke up the next morning and she was gone. She left behind everything. Like she was leaving her trace all around me to remind me of what she did and what I lost, and then she vanished. Quit her job and moved. That’s why I started doing bounty hunting and PI work. I wanted to find her, and I thought if I found her I could find closure. But the more I thought about tracking her down, the more I realized Mercy broke my fucking heart. She crushed me, and I didn’t think I was ready or would ever be ready to hear her tell me she left because she didn’t love me the way I loved her,” I ramble on, and when it catches up to me, I realize I lost control of my emotions.

  I don’t cry. I don’t ever break down, and I especially don’t cry in front of people. I can count on one hand how many times I’ve cried, and that was the morning I realized Mercy left me.

  “Oh, honey. No.” It’s my mother’s turn to comfort me, but I don’t want it. I want to tell them everything, and I want to get myself on the road and closer to finding Mercy.

  “Kellan, I’m sorry. I wish we would have known. I really do.”

  “I know, but that isn’t the worst of it. Not even close. Dad?” My father gives me a lifted brow. “I need you to not get everyone involved, because she might be in trouble and I don’t know how deep that is. But it sure as shit is dangerous enough that I don’t know who I can trust.”

  Leaning forward, he runs his hand over his peppered beard and shakes his head. “You aren’t going to ask me something that will put me between a rock and a hard place, are you, son?”

  “No. Just look into it and don’t ask others to help you. I don’t know who or what she’s running from, but in my line of work, if someone runs, they’re running from two things: someone involved in terrible shit, or someone terrible within the law. She may have an ex in the force. I don’t know, but I need you to pull any information on her, so I can find her. Can you do that for me?”

  “Yes.” He doesn’t hesitate, and my mom agrees, nodding her head.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, if you love this girl and she’s in trouble, we will find her. No matter what we do. But what made you look for her now? All these years later?”

  Here is where it gets tricky and almost hard to believe.

  “Well, this is where it gets heavy and a bit confusing—and in some roundabout way, it’s fate. I met some of Harmony’s friends at Jace and Kayla’s wedding.” My mother is best friends with Sophie Mayson, Nico’s wife, so we go to any wedding they have, and there are a lot, because the Mayson men and women run that town in Tennessee. “Well, Kayla has some family with close friends who came to the wedding, and they remembered meeting Nico. They got in contact with him, and he called me with the case. I met them for coffee, and they gave me her name and some pictures, and Mercy she was in my lap. They’re her friends, and she took off out of nowhere. Just like with me. And I know now that she didn’t leave because she didn’t love me, but she fucking ran to get away from what was trying to get her.”

  I tell them everything, all of my talking being long-winded and filled with what I’m sure is insane information that seems more like a riddle. Even I can’t believe how the web of people led us back together. If this were a cheesy romance novel and I didn’t still have some of my man card left, I would even call this serendipity.

  “Do you have any idea where she would have gone?” My mother is clearly concerned. And my father is processing. His brows are furrowed, and he’s putting on the role of officer—which is exactly what I need.

  “No, I don’t know where she went. Whoever else is looking for her ransacked her place, and she didn’t leave much of anything around for me to find. I have her name, phone number, and that’s it, but I think she left her phone behind, since she hasn’t answered me. But she’s smart enough to lose the phone once someone finds her.” My skin gets hot again, my hands aching to wrap around the neck of whoever has my girl running and hiding. Why wouldn’t she tell me? I could have helped her through it, but she left me out of everything and didn’t trust me enough to protect her. I promised her I would always defend and love her, and she still didn’t trust me. And that is how I know whatever mud she’s stuck in is fucking dangerous.

  “Did you give Nico everything? How about some of your other contacts?” my father asks.

  “Yes, I sent him everything, and a couple of the other contacts I have in the surrounding states. I didn’t want to get the police too involved, but the game changed. I need everyone looking for her.”

  “Good. Give me everything and I will start looking into it.” That’s all he says. He doesn’t even try to argue it or question if this is something I should do.

  “I’m sorry you have to go through this, baby.” My mom breaks the heavy and dives straight into my emotions, just like a good mom would.

  “It’s all fucked up, Ma.” I drop my head into my hands and forfeit. Giving into the feeling and surrendering to the fight of trying to understand how we got to this point. When I find her, she and I will figure that out together, because when I find her—and I promise myself I will—she’s going to explain everything in detail, and I won’t let her slip away again. Ever again.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15