But this ‘me’ wasn’t Elvis, playful, flirtatious, badass in all ways. This ‘me’ was Robert ‘Bobby’ Jenkins, the one who had lost everything that had ever meant something to him.
“I’m turning in,” he said as he downed the rest of his vodka, and in a contradiction of who he had been for the past fifteen years, he went to bed alone.
Sleep came in fragments as dreams of high school hallways and prom nights filled his slumber. Julia’s head on his shoulder during old Elvis Presley movies while his mom dozed in the recliner nearby, sick but smiling as she told them to turn the volume up because she loved that one.
“Elvis, wake up,” Hawk said, tossing a pillow at him. “We need to go.”
“Go where? What time is it?”
Squinting at the window, all he saw was darkness outside. “It’s not even daylight yet. I’m not doing this again. Go back to sleep.”
“We’ve got a problem,” Hawk said. “Now get out of bed.”
“What problem?” He rolled back over, pulling the covers back up to his shoulders. “Never mind. I don’t want to know. I’m sure Levi can handle it.”
“Nope. You need to drag your ass out of bed. We got to join Levi and the others.”
Elvis growled, still not opening his eyes. “Why?”
“Blaze called. Someone’s been digging into your girl.”
Elvis shot into a sitting position. “What? Who?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
DELANEY WASN’T SURE WHEN she had finally fallen asleep, but it hadn’t been easy. She probably fell asleep exhausted from all the tossing and turning, her mind scolding her for lying to Bobby about who she really was. The look on his face had haunted her all throughout the day and into the night, the way he stood there, mouth ajar, brow pinched, disbelief all over his face. And he knew she was lying to him. But he simply stood there and watched as she walked off.
And she couldn’t get away from him fast enough.
It hadn’t been her choice to run off in the middle of the night with her family. She had fought it with every ounce she had, thrown a fit as her parents packed the vital things, just a few because it couldn’t look like they were leaving on purpose. They couldn’t take anything that someone might find later and use it to point to who they really were. Any little thing could expose them and risk their lives. At least that’s what she had been told when they dragged her from her room and all her possessions.
And in typical high-strung teenage fashion she told them she didn’t care. She wasn’t going anywhere. She had a life there, a boyfriend, someone she intended to spend the rest of her life with. They couldn’t make her leave him.
But they did.
Her father had sat her down on the bed, his hand on her arm, and explained that they couldn’t leave her behind, not even with relatives. That the man her mother was giving evidence on would kill her just in the slight chance of getting to her mother. The four of them had to leave together, and they had to leave that very night. Her mother would give her testimony the following week, the family being stashed in a safe house until it was over, and then they would be relocated with new identities and new lives.
She didn’t want a new life, but it was never her choice. They actually made her leave everything behind, anything that would remind her of the life she had before that dreadful night.
And the worst part was that she never even got to say goodbye.
She cried a lot that first year, remaining quiet at the new school, refusing to make new friends, refusing to accept that her life was over. It didn’t matter that they gave her a new one. She wanted the one she already had. And she forced herself to put Bobby Jenkins out of her mind. To forget about the long walks along cobblestone streets. To forget the plans the two of them had made.
At first, she had determined that she would merely wait until she was eighteen and then leave, find Bobby once more, and then pick up where they had left off. But Marshall Donovan Ashland had told her that even that was impossible. The people her mother testified against wouldn’t forget about them in a year or two. They’d forever be watching for them to resurface, any of them. As much as he hated to tell her this, she could regain nothing of her old life again. She needed to focus on a new future as Delaney Rhodes, leaving Julia Moretti in the forgotten past forever.
It was the same with her extended family. They’d be watched, hoping someone would reach out for a birthday or anniversary, send a card at Christmas, or a simple call to tell them someone had died or gotten sick. Any contact—a phone call, letter, birthday card, email—could cost them their lives at some point, and the government had spent too much money protecting them to let them risk that.
Deke had repeated it over and over until she finally gave up. But that was then, before she had seen him, before she came face to face with him in the conference room of the casino. And now she couldn’t stop wondering what had happened to him after her family had entered WIT-SEC. Even if the criminals had been waiting for her to do a search on Robert M. Jenkins back then, there was no way they could still be keeping an eye out for that.
She had grabbed her laptop, plopped down on her bed, and typed Bobby’s name in the search bar. He graduated from their high school with a letter from playing football, but no other mentions. He went into the Navy almost immediately after graduation and then made it into the SEALs. She couldn’t find out much about his missions or where he had been deployed, but she could see most of his commendations. And then he got out and joined others from his team at Garrison Security Innovations. He was smart, brave as hell, and just as deadly. He had done great for himself and his country.
And apparently he was still single.
Never married, actually.
And there were plenty of pictures of him on social media that showed why. He had a ton of women hanging on his arm—or other parts of him. Most of them were barely dressed and looked drunk as hell.
So much for him yearning after me.
