He shoves his hand into his hair, making it stand on end. “I’m the civilized brother, the one who always knows what to say, and in this moment, that’s fucking hard. So sometimes I growl, because there’s something about you that makes me feel completely uncivilized.”
“Me?”
“Jesus.” He covers his face with his hands, then leans against his desk. “Yes, woman. You.”
“Zane Kincaid doesn’t growl?” I repeat what he said as a question, just trying to catch up. He’s on edge, and I don’t know how to manage that.
He stares at me.
My heart trips double-time against my ribcage. “But he does refer to himself in the third person?”
The stare intensifies. Then he cracks, barking out a surprised laugh. He nods, his big body shaking. “He apparently does.”
I exhale in relief.
Slowly, he comes around the desk and sits on the edge of it. "Hope…I need to talk to you about your car."
Ice water floods my veins. "Is it worse than they thought?"
"Cash can fix it. That part's not the problem." He crosses his arms over his chest. Not to intimidate—I can read his body language well enough by now to know he's bracing himself. "When he was working on it today, he found something."
The room shrinks and my pulse roars.
“There was a tracker wired into your battery. Small. Cash said it was well hidden—he only found it because he was looking for it. It's been dealt with," he adds quickly. “He pulled it out this afternoon and I drove it to a truck stop north of Calgary. Put it on a northbound rig and waited to make sure it got on its way. Whoever is tracking you is going to think your car is on its way to Edmonton and beyond by morning."
I hear his words through a thick wall of icy panic, distorted and distant.
Every stop I made. Every hour I drove, thinking I was that much closer to freedom.
Derek knew where I was the whole time. He knows where I am now.
“I can’t stay,” I whisper.
“No, that’s not—” He pushes off the desk, approaching me slowly. Stopping just shy of where I’m clutching a bookshelf like it’s a life raft. “You’resafe here. We’ll keep you out of town for a bit, but there’s nothing connecting you to this ranch. Mercy and Cash are the only ones who know where you are, and they would never tell a soul.”
"You don't know what he can do." The words come out ragged. "You don't know him."
"No. I don't. But I think it’s time you tell me more about him so I can be prepared.”
"Oh God." I press my fist to my mouth.
"Hope—"
"I thought I was so smart." My voice cracks and I hate it. "I thought I was—I watched his patterns for months. I timedeverything. I checked for trackers, Zane. Ichecked. And the whole time he could just—he could see?—"
A sob tears out of me, so unexpected and violent that my knees buckle.
Zane catches me in his arms, scooping me up. "Hey. Hey." His voice is low and close to the top of my head. The room spins as he turns, carrying me across to the big leather chair behind his desk. His grip doesn’t lessen even after he sits down. "Listen to me. Whatever he knew before? He doesn't know now. The tracker is gone, I made sure of it. Tell me who he is, Hope. Trust me with this, please."
I shake my head, but he waits me out. He rubs my back, his hand big and sure and warm through the soft cotton of his t-shirt that I’ve claimed as my own.
But then his hand curves down to my side and I suck in a breath, wincing even though the bruises there are mostly faded.
He goes still, then shifts me off his lap, ever so carefully, and sets my hips against the edge of his desk, bracketing my legs with his. “Hope?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Are you hurt?” He reaches for the hem of my shirt. His shirt.
