Page 79

As soon as the car is off, he leans in and unbuckles my seat belt before gently pulling me out of the car and into his arms. A flood of calm settles over me at his touch but there is this nagging thought in the back of my mind that something is very, very wrong. Holding me so close that it’s difficult to breathe, he buries his face in my neck and releases a breath. I can feel the tension in his body and it seeps into me as my mind spins with possibilities as I wrap my arms around his neck, my chest feeling tight.

“What happened, baby?” I whisper and he shakes his head. His lips press to my neck like he needs the kiss more than I do and my stomach twists as fear snakes down my spine. “Please talk to me, Wyatt.”

He pulls back and looks down the street before meeting my eyes. The haunted look dancing in his eyes makes my heart race and my hands shake as tears sting my eyes. “Let’s go inside.”

“Okay. Just let me grab my things.”

Without another word, he releases me, grabs my hand, and reaches into the car, grabbing my purse and my phone out of the passenger seat before pulling me into his side and slamming the door shut. He holds me close as we walk up the front walk, his eyes flicking around the neighborhood like he’s waiting for someone to ambush us. My heart crashes against my rib cage and tears fill my eyes as the hair on my arms raises.

I swear I can feel someone’s eyes on me…

As soon as we get in the house, Wyatt shuts the door and makes sure it’s locked before he runs into the kitchen. I follow him, my hands shaking and watch as he does the same to the back door.

“Wyatt,” I call as he walks past me into the hallway and he holds one finger up before disappearing into our room. When he comes out again, he has a pistol in his hand and he goes to the window, pulling the new curtains I just put up yesterday back to peek outside.

“What is going on?” I yell, desperate as panic claws at my insides and the tears start slipping down my face. His head jerks to me. The need to keep watch wars with his need to comfort me on his face and after a second, he sets the gun on the dining room table before closing the distance between us and pulling me into his arms. A sob shakes my body as I grip his t-shirt and I can’t tell if it’s fear or comfort taking over my body as he presses his lips to the top of my head.

“I’m sorry, Pip.”

I shake my head as I pull back to look up at him, wiping my face. “Don’t apologize. Just tell me what is going on.”

“Okay,” he answers with a sigh as he runs his fingers through his hair and nods. His mind is spinning, I can see it plain as day on his face and I know something serious is going on but I can’t even come up with a single reason to explain his behavior. Wyatt isn’t the one who gets scared, I am. So what is it that has him so freaked? He sighs again like he’s working up the courage to tell me and nods.

“The guys and I were working at the charity carnival this afternoon and when we went back to the clubhouse, someone had broken in. They plastered pictures of these girls who were killed all over the walls…”

“Wait… what the hell are you saying?” I ask as I struggle to process the words coming out of his mouth. A break-in at the clubhouse and dead girls? Why does the club have anything to do with dead girls? He grabs my shoulders and meets my gaze, keeping me steady.

“You know what the club does, right?”

I nod. He explained it to me the other night but I still don’t see the connection.

“Three girls that we have helped are dead now and up until this afternoon, I was the only one who thought they were connected. Someone is coming after the club and they have been for a while now.”

My knees feel weak as my heartbeat thunders in my ears. “You’re scaring me, Wyatt.”

“I know,” he whispers, a tortured look on his face. “And I hate every second of it but I need you to be scared, baby. Fuck, I’m scared.”

“Who is doing this? Are we really in that much danger?”

He shakes his head and releases me. “I don’t know…”

I open my mouth to try and ask him another question but he turns and heads for the front door, unlocking it and ripping it open before marching outside.

“Wyatt?!”

Frozen in the middle of my living room, I stare at the open door, my heart racing out of control as I try to take deep breaths to calm myself but it’s not working anymore.

What the hell is going on?

He runs back into the room with three folders full of papers in his hand and slams the door behind him, locking it again before he walks over to the dining room table and slaps them down.

“These are the girls. The club helped each one of them and shortly afterward, they were murdered. At first, we thought it was their boyfriends or husband or whoever we helped them get away from until this last girl…” He flips open a folder. “…Sammy was found dead. The guy we helped her get away from is dead so he couldn’t have been the one to kill her. That’s when I started looking into the cases but no one else believed that it was anything more than bad luck. With the work we do, it’s not impossible that a girl would go back to her man, you know? Abusive relationships and the emotions that go along with them are complicated.”

I nod, my mind starting to piece it all together. “And what happened today?”

“We came back from the carnival and their autopsy pictures were blown up and pasted on every wall in the clubhouse like some kind of demented wallpaper with a note that said, ‘I am winning’.”

“Winning?” I breathe, the implications crashing down on me. “Winning what?”