“I always swore I’d never stay if a man hit me. You know?” Caleb nodded, and she stuttered when his jaw clenched, but she kept going. “But the first time he did it, he was so sorry. He begged me to forgive him. I thought I had, and I stayed. I was stupid, huh?”
“No,” he answered softly. “You aren’t stupid. I’m guessing you were stunned, blindsided, in shock… most likely all three, and a whole host of other shit.”
He wasn’t supposed to be so kind, damn it. He was supposed to agree she’d been stupid to stay.
“What happened to make you leave?”
“I became his punch bag.” She hated herself for allowing that to happen almost as much as she hated Janek for doing it to her. “I thought if it was just me, then everyone else was safe.”
“You were wrong?”
“Oh yeah. So wrong.” She picked at the label on the water bottle to give her nervous fingers something to do. “I came home from the grocery store early. I’d forgotten to bring my purse and walked in just as he strangled the butler.”
“Butler?”
That’s what he got from that? Not that Janek had murdered a man with his bare hands, but that the man was the butler? “Um, yes, butler. Janek’s family has money. He’s a dick, but he’s a loaded dick.” God, she hoped he didn’t think she was a gold digger after that remark.
“What happened?” Caleb asked. “Did he see you?”
“Yeah, he saw me.” She shuddered. The echoes of the fear and confusion of that day almost stole her voice. “I grabbed my purse off the table and ran.”
“I’m assuming he went after you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, he sent his goons. But chasing a woman down the middle of Manhattan is not a good look for anyone. I went to the cops.” They’d been only too delighted to listen to her. “What I hadn’t known was Janek was on their radar. They had enough of a hard-on for him to call in the FBI, and they offered me a place in witness protection. I took it for all the good it did.”
“I’m guessing that didn’t last?”
Her instincts told her he’d paid someone off to be able to find that information, but she couldn’t prove it. “Not because of anything the cops did. Or maybe it was, I don’t know.”
“He found you?”
Damn, he is good at reading between the lines.
She nodded. “Yes, and they killed the agents who’d been assigned to protect me, and I was running again. I found a library and looked up how to live off-grid so nobody can find you.”
“Tell me.”
“I use cash for everything. I take the bus and not the train. Or I walk if possible. I work cash in hand...” She trailed off. She probably shouldn’t tell him that. Although it probably didn’t matter now that she had to leave again. She wouldn’t be going back to Aces again. She refused to bring trouble to their door. “I don’t use a phone. I also have no internet and never go online anymore. I printed out the list of what I needed to do from that library, and that’s the last time I was on the internet.”
“How did he find you this time?”
“I don’t know.” She’d been trying to figure it out and had come up blank. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“What changed in the last week or so?”
“I agreed to take photos for the wedding when Indy and Draven’s photographer canceled on them at the last minute.” For a second, panic engulfed her as she tried to figure out if someone close to the couple knew Janek.
Caleb covered her closed fists with his hand, his thumb stroking along her wrist. “I’ve known Draven Kilkenny and most of the people involved or who were at the wedding for years. They aren’t involved. I’d stake my trident pin on it.”
“Then I don’t know how he found me. There has to be a connection.”
“Can I send all this information to Tex? If there’s a connection, he’ll find it.”
She wanted so badly to hand it over to him. For once, she just wanted what every woman on the planet craved. Safety. Protection—love. “Will…”
“Aside from my team and maybe Wolf, Tex won’t tell a soul,” Caleb promised as if he knew what she was going to ask.
She was rapidly running out of options, and she hated it. She made a snap decision. “Do it.” Instant relief sent exhaustion through her, and she slumped forward. “I’m just so tired of everything.”
