“We don’t know.” Prickett speaks softly. “We pulled up to the cabin just as another vehicle was leaving … we walked inside and found you lying dead in the foyer. Gunner performed CPR while Sarah called 911, and I went after the car. By then, it was too late. It was gone. After we searched the house, we realized she had to have been in the car. We figured by the smear of your blood on the floor that she was dragged away.”
Throwing my two legs off the side of my bed, I try to stand, but my knees give out. I fall but catch myself on the side of the bed.
“Ryat …” Gunner runs over to me and grips my arms to help me stand.
I shove him away. Well, I try but he doesn’t budge. “I need my phone. I have to go get it…”
“No.”
“Yes. I can’t be here.” Not while she’s out there. Somewhere alone. Lost. Terrified. I should be with her. I should be protecting her. “My phone …”
“Ryat!” Gunner snaps as Prickett runs out of the room.
I yank the IV out of my arm, and blood squirts onto the bed.
“Ryat, get back in bed!” Gunner demands.
“No. I need my goddamn phone.” Why aren’t they listening to me? “It was in my jeans …”
The door bangs open, hitting the interior wall, and Prickett enters with a couple of nurses. They don’t even give me the chance to explain.
Prickett shoves his elbow into my back, forcing me to bend over the side of the bed when I feel a pop in my hip. Then my eyes close with her name on my lips.
_______________
“WHAT …?” MY HEADis foggy once again. The light blinding. I blink, tilting my head to the side. I go to rub my eyes but realize my wrists are restrained to the hospital bed.
Sighing, I mumble, “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“I’m afraid it’s the only option you left them.”
Opening my eyes, I see my dad standing next to the bed.
“I need to leave,” I say, feeling my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth.
“You need to recover,” he argues.
“Why does everyone keep saying that. Blakely …”
“We’ll find her.”
I open my eyes to see my father-in-law entering my room with two cups of coffee. He’s the last person I want to see, but he might be the only one who will want to find her as bad as me. “I know where she’s at,” I growl. “If anyone would let me get my goddamn phone.”
“I have it.” My dad pulls it from his back pocket. “After they sedated you, Gunner ran back to the cabin and pulled it from your jeans. I guess when the paramedics arrived, they had to cut them off you. It was still in your pocket.”
I go to reach for it, but the damn restraints stop my actions. I throw my head into the flat pillow and grind my teeth to keep from screaming. I don’t want them to sedate me again.
“Open it up,” I growl. “I have an app on there that tracks her.”
My father looks across the bed to my father-in-law, who stands on my left. “Uh,” my father starts. “Ryat, her cell was left behind. You can’t track it.”
I close my eyes, hating having to explain what I did, but also glad that I did it.
Gavin sighs. “I have to ask Ryat. Are these injuries from you?”
“No,” I snap. I’m rough with Blake during sex, but I’ve never physically beaten her. Matt slammed her face into the steering wheel, not me.
He arches a brow.
“Why would I lie about that?” It’s not like I’d be in trouble if I did do this. The Lords specifically place members into the legal system. Unfortunately, beating your wife isn’t a criminal offense. They don’t want a Lord in prison for assault or domestic violence cases when he’s needed for an assignment.
“During my initial exam,” he goes on at my silence. “I noticed the writings on her body—in Sharpie. I figured maybe things got out of hand.”
I’m not even mad about the fact that he thinks I did this, but the thought of him seeing her naked makes my fists clench. “No,” I repeat. “I didn’t beat my wife.”
“You know how it is with the Lords and their chosen’s,” he adds. “I’ve seen my fair share in here over the past twenty years since I graduated from Barrington.” He then places her X-rays up on the wall and flips the switch to the light behind it, lighting the film. I can see all of her bones from her chest up. And Gavin takes the end of a pen and points at the spot between her right shoulder and neck. “Is this what I think it is?”
“Yes.” I growl and add. “Leave it there.”
He nods once. “I just wanted to also let you know that we ran a pregnancy test. It was negative.”
I didn’t expect it to happen that fast, but I’m definitely going to keep trying.
“It’s standard procedure,” he adds.
“When I got her back after she ran, I implanted a tracker between her neck and shoulder.” I look up at her father. “So, unless Matt found out about it and cut it out, it’s still there.” No one knew.
Phil runs his hand through his hair and nods to himself. Probably fighting the fact that I did something so morally wrong, but also, it’s the only thing that might save her life now. I was never going to let her get away again.
“Okay. Yeah, okay,” he finally agrees. “Let’s track it, and I’ll go get her.”
“Hell no,” I sit up, pulling on the restraints. “I’m going with you.”
“You’re not leaving this hospital until they release you,” my father snaps.
“He’s not going without me!” I argue. I want to hold her, pick her up in my arms, and know that at that moment, she’s safe. I don’t want a fucking phone call that she was found and have to talk to her over the phone. Or worse, what if they find her body? No. I won’t believe that. She’s not dead. She’s alive, and I’m going to make sure of it with my own two eyes.
“You’re wasting time! Take these off, and let’s go.” Who knows what Matt is doing to her? But I have a hundred ideas of what I’m going to do to him. He won’t like any of them.
My father places his hand on my shoulder. “Not until your body is healed.”
“She’s pregnant,” I state.
Silence falls over the room.
“She told you?” my father asks.
“No.”
“Then you’re not sure …”
“I fucking know, okay!” I snap. I first realized it a couple of weeks ago. I think it happened Halloween night. We had sex three times that night by the time we finally went to sleep. There have been signs. I’m not even sure she’s seen them, but they’ve been there. I know my wife’s body better than herself.
My father sighs, running a hand down his face. “Did you tamper with her birth control?”
My wife straddles me while I lay on my back in our master suite at the cabin, my hands propping up my head. She runs her finger over the Lords crest that was burned into my chest, lightly tracing it. “We should get divorced in six months. My mother would flip.”
I snort at that thought. “That won’t be happening.”
Her finger pauses, and her eyes trail up over my chest and face to meet mine. “I understand why we did this, Ryat.”
“Oh, yeah? Enlighten me.” I want to hear her thoughts on why I made her mine forever.
“You don’t love me.” She shrugs. “I don’t love you. You wanted to marry me to rub it in Matt’s face. I said yes because I didn’t want him and bonus it will piss off my mom. I understand neither one of us meant forever in city hall earlier today.” Yawning, she lays her head on my bare chest.
I’m still hard. I could fuck her all night, but I’ll let her rest. After all, I have the rest of my life to fuck my wife. Because no matter what she thinks, when I took my vow today, it was forever. After several minutes of silence, her hands fall off the side of my body, and her breathing evens out.
She’s passed out.
Unlinking my fingers from behind my head, I run them through her curled hair a few times. Then gently, I roll over, placing her down next to me. I get up from the bed and make my way into the bathroom. I remove her birth control pills and then the pack that I’ve kept stashed in my bag at the back of the closet. I punch the dates she’s already used and place the placebos ones back in the drawer. Blakely isn’t going anywhere. If I have to keep her knocked up every day of our lives, I will.
“Yes—no,” I spit out. Sighing I add, “She ran and didn’t take it with her.” That very next night was the ceremony at the house of Lords where she left me. When I brought her back, I didn’t even bother with giving her the fake shit. My wife wasn’t going to be taking it anymore.
Mr. Anderson places his cup of coffee on a tray next to my bed and undoes my left wrist.
“What are you doing?” my father barks when he undoes the other.
“Didn’t you hear him? My daughter is pregnant. We need to find her now. The tracking device will lead us right to her.”
“He needs medical attention,” my father argues.
“I’ll hire a doctor. Gavin. I’ll pay for him to travel with us.”
Finally! Someone gets it!
“Hand me my cell,” I order my dad while my father-in-law exits the room, leaving us alone.
He pulls it back. “Ryat …”
“Don’t give me some bullshit!” I snap and flinch. My free hand now pushing into my side to try relieving the burning pressure I feel. It doesn’t work.
“How in the fuck are you going to save her?” he demands. “Ryat, you’re injured. I know you love her, but risking your life to save hers just puts you both in danger. Again.”
Baring my teeth, I glare up at him. “Hand me my goddamn phone.”
The door swings open, and my father-in-law returns along with Gavin. “I must advise against—”
“I’m fucking going,” I interrupt the doctor. My heavy breathing fills the room, and I bite my inner cheek to keep from whimpering at the pain in my side. Fuck me, I can’t breathe.
“I’ll send you with pain pills, but Ryat … I can’t go with you,” Gavin informs me.
“That’s … fine.” I manage to get out, I’ll eat them like candy. Enough drugs can make you feel invincible.
My father runs his hand through his hair aggressively and hisses in a curse. “Goddammit, Ryat. You don’t even know she’s alive!”