I’m not naive. I realize he’s not helping me breathe out of kindness. But when my lungs settle and it no longer feels likemy chest will crush my heart, I can’t deny the strange flicker of warmth in my stomach.
He flits his eyes over me once, twice, confirming that I’m settled. He nods, leaves the burlap hood off, and returns to the front of the van with his two fellow criminals.
As I watch his retreating back, the warmth dissipates and curls into shame before squeezing my heart like a vine.
Beneath the realization that my kidnapper knows more about stopping panic attacks than a psychology major lies the cold fear that, if I can’t control my emotions, I might lose my rational mind for good.
Without that, I have no way to fight back.
Or to escape the monster who cut through my terror with ease.
Chapter 4
Brody
We drive straight back to Los Angeles.
Traffic’s mild, allowing us to get back to the city quickly. We hit the metro area at barely past noon.
The entire time, Trinity remains stiff and silent.
With the hood off, she observes and analyzes everything, the intensity of her gaze prickling the back of my neck. She’s not the fiery woman who first tried to escape when I grabbed her. She’s quiet now, almost demure.
I don’t trust it for a second.
In the rearview mirror, her green eyes catch mine, and I glance away at the flowing traffic before I get distracted.
I know better than to let my guard down around a target. Even a pretty one.
Still, her freak-out was genuine. I recognized the signs as soon as I heard her shallow, hysterical breaths.
I walked her through that panic attack because I knew how. I was prone to them myself as a child, after my mother died and I learned that Declan’s not my biological father.
I’ll never forget the way Declan’s hard eyes iced over when he looked at me, the boy he’d helped raise all those years. The boy who wasn’t his.
I’ve been trying to melt that ice ever since.
Shutting out the memories, I return to the matter at hand. I calmed Trinity not because I care, but because an untreated anxiety-induced fit creates too much of a liability.
I need her compliant, not exploding in the back seat. Declan will kill me if I fuck up this job, and letting Trinity die from a fear-fueled heart attack would definitely count as “fucking up.”
Speaking of my father…
I slip my phone from my pocket and dial him. As we fly down the highway, the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles get more prominent.
On the second ring, the call connects. My shoulders straighten instinctively. “I got the girl.”
“Finally.” Declan never wastes time with praise or thanks. “Meet at the rendezvous point. We’ll take things from there.”
Before I can utter so much as ayessir, he hangs up. A second later, the phone buzzes against my palm.
I toggle to my message feed for the coordinates.
“Where we headed?” Marko’s voice stretches around the cigarette pinched between his lips.
“Koreatown.” I work the map with my fingers. “Somewhere near the intersection of Wilshire and Normandie.”
“Perfect. I’m starving.” Jed rolls down the passenger window and spits. “Let’s drop off the goods and grab some barbeque.”
