Page 91 of Disavowed

He’d saved more than four hundred lives that day and taken down the last surviving members of the Pyramid’s dwindling organization of assassins. Turned out Marsden, Smith, and Jack were the last of them, and they really had been trying to recruit new killers to join their ranks. Marsden had wanted his evil legacy to live on.

The hotel’s security team had lived, having only been shot up with enough tranquilizer to sleep for an entire day. Ironically, Christopher Shane had survived, only to be disgraced and forced to step down as CEO of Fairhaven Hotels and Resorts. In a way, Marsden had gotten what he’d wanted all along—Shane lost his baby.

She’d heard from Gray that the police commissioner and mayor wanted to pin a medal on Dom. But since no one knew for certain whether he was dead or alive, they’d put off any ceremony.

Daisy sighed, still in shock and disbelief. Eventually, she would get over the trauma of nearly dying, but the aftermath of that day would always be with her.

Gray had done his best to ease things for her, but after being interviewed incessantly by the NYPD, the FBI, INTERPOL, and so many other agencies whose acronyms she’d lost track of, she’d needed a break. Marjie had stepped up and taken care of the shop while Daisy took a month off. When she’d gone back to work, more lucrative city contracts flowed in, and she’d been forced to hire another assistant and two new drivers. But, at least for the moment, her heart wasn’t in her job.

The puppy licked her chin, and Daisy did something else she hadn’t done in months. She laughed.

As her closest friend, Alex had, of course, been there for her, and she’d told Alex everything. Including the part about Dom professing his love. Losing him was hard enough, but even if he were here he could never replace the family she’d lost, and it would have been unfair to place that kind of burden on him. It was just that she’d hoped…no, dreamed that she and Dom could have started their own family.

So after sharing her heartache with Alex, she’d locked away the pain and loss and thrown that emotional suitcase into the back of her closet. She took a shuddering breath, willing the heart-wrenching sob building in her chest to remain there.

“You should keep her.”

Daisy flinched. She’d been so absorbed by her thoughts she hadn’t heard Alex and Cassie walk up on her. Alex sat on the grass and draped an arm around Daisy’s shoulder, giving her a brief hug.

“She’s my gift to you.” Cassie knelt beside them and scratched the pup’s ear. “This little girl is usually a holy terror, running and spinning like she’s possessed by the devil. She’s like that crazy animal in those old cartoons. The hairy one that spins around and around. What’s the name of that thing?”

“You mean the Tazmanian Devil?” Alex reached out to pet the puppy.

Cassie snapped her fingers. “That’s the one. Except when you’re around,” she added, pointing at Daisy, “she’s an angel. You have a soothing effect on her, and I think you’d be perfect together. She needs you. And you need her.”

Score. Direct hit.

She gave Cassie a smile she didn’t really feel. There was no doubt she did need someone, but that someone was gone. She swallowed the lump in her throat, willing herself not to cry. Over the last three months she’d cried so much she thought her tear ducts were dried up. They weren’t, not completely, and a single, stubborn tear rolled down her cheek.

“We’re here for you.” Alex gave her shoulders another squeeze. “You know that, right?”

She nodded and shut her eyes, wishing she could wake up tomorrow with instant amnesia. No memory of the past few months. No memory of Dom coming back into her life.

A gust of wind blew a strand of hair in front of her eyes, but she didn’t want to disturb the puppy that’d fallen asleep in her arms.

“You know,” Cassie said as she tucked the wayward strand behind Daisy’s ear for her, “Alex told me what Dom said to you in the hotel. That he loved you.”

“Please, don’t.” Daisy shook her head. “I can’t do this anymore. I have to forget him.” Or die trying.

“Hear me out.” Cassie nodded to Alex. “Gray, Alex, and I have been talking, and we don’t think you should give up hope.”

She opened her mouth to cut the woman off, but Cassie kept right on going.

“First of all, wherever Dom is, he’s not dead. I don’t believe that for one second. We’d know by now. He would have turned up somewhere. What I’m talking about is that in all the years he was my partner, he never once fell in love. Partners share everything, and I would have known. Gray wouldn’t say much but confirmed that Dom loved a woman in Afghanistan, and when she was killed there, it nearly killed him.”

Anika.

“Then he met you,” Alex said softly. “He fell head over heels in love with you, then came a hair’s breadth from losing you right before his eyes.”

“Talk about PTSD,” Cassie added. “You gotta give the guy a chance. He’s been through hell and back more than once. He needs time to process, and both Gray and I figure that’s exactly what he’s doing.”

Across the yard, Gray and Mike stood at the grill, flipping steaks and drinking beer while Nicky entertained Raven’s puppies. She wanted that. Had always wanted that. A family.

Is that too much to ask?

“No.” She shook her head again, more adamantly this time. “I don’t want to wait any longer. It’s time to move on. I have to.” She took a deep, cleansing breath. “And I will take this puppy. Thank you,” she said to Cassie.

“You’re taking a puppy, too?” Nicky grinned from where he stood behind them with Jet frolicking around his legs. “What are you gonna call him?”