There are no questions.
No interrogation.
It’s confusing, but at least it gives me time to gather my thoughts and process what is happening around me in silence. I am safe, yet I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve made a huge mistake.
I think back to the phone booth. My father’s words made me panic. And I was confused when I let him have security pick me up.
Now I close my eyes against the memory, remembering the look on Axel’s face when he realized what I had done.
He looked hurt.
Devastated.
Betrayed.
I don’t know the full story about what had happened between Axel and Anastasia Crawford, but I can’t believe he kidnapped her for a ransom and then killed her when it went wrong.
I know him.
He isn’t capable of that.
Yet, I had panicked.
I trusted my father more than anyone in the world. Hearing him say those things about Axel had confused me, and by the time I realized my mistake, it was too late and the damage was done.
“I’ve made a terrible mistake,” I whisper.
Hardy looks over and his brow lifts. “How so?”
“There has been a misunderstanding. I have to go.” I stand up and the blanket drops to the floor. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time.”
I go to leave but Hardy stops me, stepping between me and the door. “I can’t let you do that.”
“Excuse me?”
“Your fiancé is on his way. I can’t let you leave until he gets here.”
“You can’t keep me here.”
“Oh, I think I can.”
Our eyes lock. His are cold. Hard and mean. I’m about to argue with him when the door opens and Vince walks in.
The moment I lay eyes on him, my heart breaks. His arms around me are as cold as ice, and his touch does nothing to dull the pain I’m feeling in my chest as he holds me against his expensive suit. Despite the sugary syrup in his words and his over-the-top sympathy, I am completely disconnected from him.
I don’t love him.
Hell, I don’t even like him.
And I certainly don’t want to marry him.
I miss Axel.
Painfully.
Despite what they say about him, I feel an excruciating void being away from him. I wasn’t lying when I said I was falling for him. But I had been wrong. Because I’m not falling for him … I’m already in love with him.
And I ache to be back in the cabin with him, safe in his arms and lost in his body as he makes love to me.
Not here with a man I can barely stand the sight of, and people who can’t begin to appreciate what I’d found in that little cabin with a wild beast of a mountain man.
I’ve made a terrible mistake.
A new plan forms amidst the chaos inside my head. I’ll return to the lodge and pack my things. I will tie off loose ends—one of them being a five-foot-eight jerk in an Armani suit—then hire a car so I can drive back here and somehow find Axel’s cabin.
Then I’ll beg him for his forgiveness.
But I have broken his heart and he might not forgive me for walking away.
We leave town in Vince’s car and drive through the rainy streets back to the lodge. Staring out the window, I press myself against the polished leather of the door trying to create as much space between Vince and me.
Every part of me aches with longing. I want to turn back time and go back to the moment I destroyed everything.
I would hang up the phone when my father told me about Axel, and walk back to the love of my life waiting for me in the car. We would drive back to the sanctuary of our cabin, and no one would ever find us. Lauren Carmichael would be gone. Replaced by a happy, love-kissed mountain woman who lived her life freely among the pines and misty mountain slopes with a man who loved her and would give his life to protect her.
I turn away from the window to look at Vince.
Alarm tingles up my spine.
“Why didn’t the police pick him up?” I ask him, the thought only now occurring to me. “Why am I not being interviewed?”
Vince keeps his eyes on the road.
“He tried kidnapping you, Lauren. We execute our own justice. He’s not going to prison. He’s going to a grave.”
My alarm ignites into fear and it rips through me.
Axel.
“You can’t hurt him,” I say desperately.
But Vince’s eyes are as cold as ice as he looks at me with vile smugness.
“Too late, Lauren. He’s already dead.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
LAUREN
“You’re lying,” I say.
I’m terrified.
If Vince has done something to Axel, I will kill him.
“Why would I lie about something like that?” he asks, his eyes pinned to the road.
Because you lie about everything.
I glare at him. Hating him. “If you do something to him, I will go to the police.”
Vince narrows his eyes, but keeps them fixed on the road. “What’s done is done, Lauren. It’s better handled this way.”
“No, it’s not. It’s wrong. And if you have anyone hurt him, I’ll make sure you have to answer for it.”
His jaw ticks. “We’ll see.”
We drive in stony silence through the rainy streets back to the lodge.
I feel sick.
No.
I feel nothing.
I am numb.
I just go through the motions. Breathing. Heart beating. One foot in front of the other. Praying Vince is lying.
In the lodge’s impressive foyer, I look around. My father isn’t here, but I’m not surprised. He will still be working. No point hanging around Mirror Lake looking for his only child when he could make millions at work. He’ll fly in later once he’s sure I’m here.
My feet feel like stone as I walk up the sweeping staircase, remembering the night I was taken by the mountain man. Remembering his eyes. The hardness of his body. The warmth. The excitement as he took me into the darkness.
In my room, I see Vince has brought his belongings over from where he was staying with his groomsmen. They spill out of a suitcase on the floor, and his shaving kit is already in the bathroom.
Feeling shaky, I sit down on the end of the bed and watch as he walks across the room to the attached dressing room.
He removes his jacket and his wallet, and places them on a dresser. Followed by a gun.
My eyes dart from the weapon to him. “Why do you have a gun?”
“Someone kidnapped you, Lauren. I’m not risking another attempt.”
I don’t believe him.
It’s too much of an easy excuse.
My throat goes dry and an uneasiness creeps up my spine.
Vince keeps his back to me as he reaches for a hanger. I watch him, feeling so alien from him and from this moment. As I shift on the bed, my hand slides across the comforter and lands on something cold and sharp.
An earring.
I pick it up. It’s not mine.
It’s Shanna’s. I know it’s hers because it’s one half of the pair I bought her for her twenty-eighth birthday last June.
She’s been in here while I was gone. In this bed. With him. More than likely consoling him with her vagina.
I look at Vince and it’s so vibrantly clear. Axel was right. Vince is behind the plan to kidnap me and to hold me for ransom. I don’t know why. He’s rich. It’s not like he needs the money.