Dammit, I should have known that she was into something like this. Trace is one of those women who get headhunted by organizations all the time because of the secret testing some colleges carry out on gifted students. The woman has a knack for reading body language from long years spent trying to navigate the shark-infested waters of the social elite.
She’s a Goddamned profiler. I just know it.
Shit.
“Where would she go? Who would she start with?” I ask, shoving my feet into a pair of socks and making for the door.
“Ronny maybe?” Miah asks.
“Too simple. If it were Ronny, Paulie would have called since she’s staying over at her place this week to visit with Cleo.”
“Damn, Jared. You’re like one of those creepy husbands who know everything about their wives, man.” Miah laughs, making me chuckle despite my pain and the fear coursing through me.
“Shut up, idiot.”
“So if not Ronny, then who?” I yell, practically running for the exit at this point.
I’m not a worrier, well not normally, but I have a really bad feeling about this situation and I can’t let my girl get hurt when I should have been protecting her instead of laid out on my ass in a hospital bed.
Weak-ass punk, Jace. You take one measly bullet and you need someone to kiss your boo-boo?
We’re in Jared’s SUV by now and I almost start hitting shit when he just sits there and stares into space.
“Jared.”
“I don’t know where to go, man. I just don’t…”
This is a first for me, seeing my usually strong and well-tempered brother at a loss. Jared is usually the one who has it all figured out, one step ahead of the enemy.
With Roman gone and Trace now in the wind…
“Give me your phone, Miah.”
It takes two rings before she answers, and I could kick myself for not thinking of this sooner.
“Where are you?”
“Well hello to you, too, Mr. Grumps. You feeling better?”
“Trace, do not joke around with me right now, babe. Where. Are. You?”
The silence that follows is deafening, and I’m crushing the dash beneath my fist before she finally sighs and answers.
“I just left Melissa Dobson’s place. The house is a mess and she’s nowhere in sight, Jace. Someone took her by force, I think. It doesn’t look good.”
“Trace, get the hell out of there right now.”
“Calm down. Just calm down and breathe, okay? You’re not supposed to mess with your blood pressure right after surgery. I’m fine. I have a team with me and a gun, besides. I’ll be fine. I’m just going on a hunch here and I need to follow it to the end.”
“Tracy, do not go digging by yourself. Please, babe, I’m begging here,” I say, sweating bullets when she doesn’t answer immediately.
“I won’t, Jace, I promise. I’ll stay as safe as possible. I—”
“You know they took Roman, right? And probably Melissa, too, from the sounds of it. They’ve seen us together, Trace.”
“Oh, I’m counting on it, Lane, I’m counting on it.”
“Trace—”
“Remember that day you took me to the ice cream parlor and we ordered every flavor on the menu?” she asks out of the blue, making me frown at the abrupt change of subject.
“Yeah, I guess. You ate so much ice cream you puked in Mrs. Toledo’s garden before we could make it home.”
That gets a giggle and I find myself laughing at the memory of her embarrassment and later her joy at having done something so simple as puking from overindulgence.
My Trace has always taken such delight in doing things that her parents would not have approved of. That specific day I dared her to go all on everything her parents would never let her eat because they were always so image conscious, they wouldn’t let her go over her perfect BMI.
It was one of the happiest days of my life, after I cleaned her up and waited two hours to make love to her.
“Yea. That was my best day with you. You gave me something I never had and took care of me afterward when I smelled like puke and looked like hell. You even kissed me, though I was gross. It was that day that I finally believed you loved me, Jace.”
“Trace—”
Shit.
“I do love you, Jace,” she whispers, cutting me off so thoroughly, I feel my heart kick and stutter at the words. “I just don’t want to anymore.”
That’s all I get before I hear dial tone and the unmistakable sound of my heart breaking wide open.
“Where to?” Jared asks when I hand Miah his phone back and just sit staring out the window.
“Nowhere.”
That’s the worst thing a guy like me can hear from his girl. She loves me, but the fact that she doesn’t want to anymore…is not something I can manipulate.