* * *
Daniel slowed the speed of the Harley as he and Lydia came up to the side entry of the apple orchard. After a series of humps created by truck tires, and then a stretch of molar-rattling vibration over uneven ground, they hooked up with the road that ran down the eastern side of the field. Given the season, the leaves were all off the craggy branches, but he loved the view.
Then again, with the sun on his face, his bike on a roar, and his woman on the back with her arms around him? He could have taken them on a tour of a municipal sewage plant and still thought everything was beautiful.
When the road made a fat circle and changed directions to intersect with another route, he took them deep into the acreage, slowing to a stop when they could see nothing in any direction except for the apple trees.
After he cut the engine and threw out the kickstand, he tilted the bike and let it set itself on the packed dirt of the lane.
Lydia got off first, and as the wind caught her loose hair, the waves of blond and brown feathered over her features. He was the one who tucked them back behind her ears, and then she leaned in toward his mouth.
The kiss was not brief. And when they separated, he was breathing a little heavier. So was she.
“This is such an incredible place,” she murmured as she looked around.
“Beautiful,” he said as he stared at her rosy cheeks and her bright eyes. “Best view I’ve ever seen.”
“You’re not looking at the trees,” she teased.
“Are there trees out here? I hadn’t noticed.”
Lydia laughed and wandered off a little, going over and bringing a branch down to her level. “I’ve driven by here a number of times, but I’ve never picked anything.”
“Maybe…” He cut himself off. There wouldn’t be a harvest for him next year. “I’m glad we’re here now.”
“Me, too.”
Swinging his leg over the seat, he dismounted and put his hand into the pocket of his leather coat. He hadn’t had time to get her a proper ring yet, but he couldn’t wait. Here. Now. He was going to ask her to be his wife—and knowing his Lydia, the fact that he only had a zip tie that he’d trimmed the long end off of was going to be endearing.
“Come here,” he said. “I’ve got something to ask you—”
The vibration started up in the inside pocket of his jacket, the one that was right against his pec, but as his woman turned to him with a smile, he forgot all about the phone call.
“What do you want to know?” she asked as she came over.
While his phone continued to ring on silent, he searched her face and saw nothing but simple curiosity. She had no idea what he was about to do—
“Is your phone ringing?” she said with a frown.
“No.”
Brrrrrrrrrrr. Brrrrrrrrrr. And then things went silent. Which was a good thing as he was about to take the fucking phone out, put it on the ground, and run it over a couple hundred times with his bike.
“Oh, I thought it was—”
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
As Lydia lifted her eyebrow, he shoved his hand inside his pocket and took the thing out. When he saw who it was, he frowned and answered.
“Cathy?” he said.
He was still getting used to calling the woman by the informal name, but then she wasn’t dressing like C.P. Phalen anymore—and she was going to be a mom. So yeah, big changes on the ol’ house front—
“Something’s happened to Gus,” came the urgent voice. “I don’t know anything other than he may have been abducted from his home. I don’t know when, I don’t know by who—but I need your help, Daniel.”
Daniel’s eyes shot to Lydia’s. “Do you have his address?”
“I’m texting it to you now, it’s about twenty-five minutes away. I’ll meet you there.”
Motioning for Lydia to come with him and get back on the bike, he remounted and said, “Bring backup with you.”
“They’re already pulling the cars around—” Cathy’s voice cracked. “It’s not Gunnar Rhobes. I just spoke to him. It’s someone else, but I don’t know—”
“We’ll find Gus. No matter who has him—I will bring that man back home if it’s the last thing I do on this earth.”
“Daniel…” Cathy’s voice broke. “I don’t know what I’ll do without him.”
“You’re not the only person who feels that way.”
As he hung up, there was a bing as the text with the address arrived.
“What’s going on,” Lydia asked as she wrapped her arms around herself.
He got the location on Google Maps and made sure he knew where he was going. “Gus. Something bad’s happened. We need to go to Plattsburgh.”
“Is he all right?”
“I have no idea.” Extending his hand out to her, he said, “We shouldn’t waste any time, okay?”
Abruptly, Lydia’s chin lowered and her eyes gleamed with a predator’s menace. “If anyone’s hurt that man?”
Daniel nodded. “It goes without saying. We take care of it.”
Lydia nodded grimly, gripped his palm, and hopped back on the bike. As her arms came around him again, he gave them a squeeze. Then he started the engine with a jump, pumped the gas—
—and tore off down the lane.
For that physician? For everything the man had done for him over the last six months?
Daniel was going to find out what the hell had happened—and with Lydia’s help, he was going to make sure if there were any wrongs to be righted…
The ledger was balanced.
The proper way.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
WITH SO MANY thanks to the readers of the Black Dagger Brotherhood books! This has been a long, marvelous, exciting journey, and I can’t wait to see what happens next in this world we all love. I’d also like to thank Meg Ruley, Rebecca Scherer and everyone at JRA, and Hannah Braaten, Jamie Selzer, Jennifer Bergstrom, Jennifer Long, and the entire family at Gallery Books and Simon & Schuster.
To Team Waud, I love you all. Truly. And as always, everything I do is with love to and adoration for both my family of origin and of adoption.
Oh, and thank you to Naamah, my Writer Dog II, and Obie, Writer Dog-in-Training, who work as hard as I do on my books!
Turn the page for an exclusive excerpt from:
The next installment in J. R. Ward’s #1 New York Times bestselling Black Dagger Brotherhood series!
CHAPTER ONE
5.8 miles north of Great Bear Mountain
Adirondack Park, Upstate New York
IN THE GLOAMING, the mountain air smelled of pine and earth, the scents carried on a lazy draft that trickled down the elevation, weaving around and over boulders and branches, weeds and wildlife, the frigidity of space encroaching upon the planet. Across the valley, the sun’s very last rays created a hearth in a juncture of peaks, the intersection of surging topographies forming a cup of hands in which the light could nestle for a brief, dying time, only embers now, no warmth to speak of.
As Lassiter, the fallen angel, emerged from the cave, he thought of McDonald’s.