My hobby room. I know I’m not talented. Calling all this art would be an insult to the word. Even Bob Ross couldn’t say anything nice about my paintings. Still, something about that sound of the brush dragging against the canvas, the repetitive rhythm of each stroke, seeps into my bones and tethers me to calm. When I paint, I can unplug my brain for a while.
It’s all been trashed.
“Not to anybody with a shred of good taste,” I say bitterly, taking in the broken brushes, busted tubes, and slashed canvases.
“So, this is all more of a statement,” Ruiz clips, already moving on to the next room. “Much like this one.”
The door to my bedroom is wide open, and she lingers in the hallway, allowing me to step in first.
I smell the paint before I see it. Sharp and metallic.
“What the fuck.” Carter’s voice breaks behind me, but I’m numb.
Thick red streaks cling to the wallpaper in erratic waves, dripping like blood. I follow the trace until it leads me to the words smeared in bold strokes above my bed.
My vision blurs.
My knees give out.
One second later, I’m weightless as Carter’s arms wrap around me, steadying me by the waist.
Chapter Seven
JACKIE
They’ve been at it for at least thirty minutes. The only quiet soul in the room is Joseph’s striped cat, perched on the windowsill, shooting bored glares at Derrick every time he raises his voice and disrupts her nap.
I’ve never related more to a four-legged fluffball, as the headache blooming behind my eyes keeps spreading.
It’s two in the morning, and Robertson’s formal dining room feels one argument away from blowing apart. I imagine that he’s regretting offering his estate in Irvington for the meet-up.
Angry voices ricochet off the coffered ceiling, the mahogany table crowded with the handful of people now cleared to know my whereabouts.
And Adam.
He’s been sitting across from me without saying a word, just staring. Wide frame rigid against the back of the chair, mouth a hard line. The way his green eyes bore into me would be alarming if, in an inexplicable way, his quiet presence didn’t ground me in the middle of this shit show.
“Why is he here?” Derrick jabs a finger toward Adam. “We agreed to limit the intel to the core of Jackie’s security team.”
I ask myself the same thing. But when I chance a closer look at him, something knots in my chest. He usually shows up looking put together, hair styled, crisp shirt stretched over broad shoulders. Now, his brown hair clings to his forehead, his skin a sickly kind of pale.
“Looks like you’ve done a great job,” Adam says coolly, breaking the hold of our gaze.
Logan’s nostrils flare. He doesn’t even try to be subtle when he looks at Adam like he stepped in something vile. “And what’s your plan, Erickson? Another whiskey-fueled epiphany?”
Adam doesn’t flinch, but something in me swells, fierce and hot, with the need to defend him. If I were still somebody who mattered to him, I wouldn’t need him to sweep in on a white horse and save me. I’d only need him to be there for me. It would be enough.
But he made it clear last time we met. We’re past that. He’s only here for my brother.
“Enough.” Carter slams his palms on the hardwood table. “I trust everyone here with my life.”
“Then trust me to take over securing your properties,” Logan jumps back in, relentless.
Derrick’s chair scrapes against the floor as he leans back, hands in the air. “There’s nothing wrong with the systems we already use—”
The cat, annoyed by the commotion, chooses this perfect moment to abandon her perch and slink under the table, up Logan’s legs, nestling in his lap. He doesn’t even register the animal until it nudges his hand, demanding attention.
“I deal with army-grade tech,” Logan pushes, petting the furry brat, as Derrick’s irritation grows by the second.
