Somewhere in the distance, Christmas music played. A car horn honked. Stomping footsteps rang out—the shooter’s, Cole’s, and others in the periphery, stampeding in the opposite direction.
He chased the man for blocks, jumping fences, crossing icy yards, dodging passing cars, and racing down busy avenues. Meanwhile, Dublin 22 stirred to life. And several streets away, the blare of sirens erupted.
The gardai were coming.
Given the fast approach of the sirens, he had thirty seconds tops.
Up ahead, the shooter ran into a wide intersection. Cole trailed him, twenty feet behind. The man abruptly stopped at the center and pivoted, weapon raised.
Cole halted in the street with no nearby cars or trees to take cover. With no choice but to engage in this standoff, he trained his pistol with both hands and met the man’s eyes.
Timing was everything.
“I don’t want to shoot…” He squeezed the trigger mid-sentence.
His gun clicked dry. Empty.
Oh, fucking fuck.
The shooter tipped his head, and a cold-blooded smirk twisted his lips. He held his gun out one-handed and took a cocky step forward, aimed to kill.
Cole knew his next breath would be his last, and as he drew it into his lungs, the squeal of tires sounded. A motor revved, and a speeding car flew into the intersection and slammed into the gunman. The impact hit him like a freight train, bending him in half. The wrong way.
The body buckled beneath the car, succumbing to the brutal spin of tires and bouncing the vehicle like a speed bump.
His mouth dried, his muscles locked in shock. It took a full second to snap out of his stupor and focus on the snow-covered car.
It skidded to a stop. The tires spun in reverse, and it raced backward, running over the body a second time. Hope swelled in his chest.
Ice coated the windows, blocking his view of the driver. But as the door swung open, he already knew, his feet racing forward, his heart rate exploding.
Lydia poked her head out.
“Cole!” Her neck twisted toward the sound of approaching sirens. “Hurry!”
He slid past the open door, crashing in behind the steering wheel and shoving her into the passenger seat. Then he hit the gas, bouncing over the body and speeding down the street.
She stared at the side mirror, watching the flash of chasing lights, her voice numb. “Are you shot?”
“No.”
He wanted to scold her for disobeying him and leaving the house, but under the circumstances, he wouldn’t dare. She’d lost her brother and saved Cole’s life. Her courage took his breath away, leaving him gobsmacked and awe-struck.
“Where did you get the car?” He pushed the small sedan to its mechanical limits as he squealed around bends and tore through intersections, weaving, dodging traffic, and trying to outrun the gardai behind them.
“I stole it. Where are we going?”
Her voice was wooden, her posture stiff. He couldn’t fathom how she was doing. She kept it buried, just like he’d demanded.
“Looks like I lost the gardai.” He gripped the wheel, his eyes on the rearview and his neck aching with tension. “We’ll dump the car, go to my rented apartment, and stay the night there. Tomorrow, we fly to the states.”
Without Mike.
He didn’t make promises that everything would be okay. All he could do was hope that when revenge came, it would bring her some sort of closure, something more justified and bearable than leaving her brother lying dead in the snow.
Until then, he would hold her through the pain.
Cole didn’t know how to do this, if he was doing it right or making it worse. He wasn’t a grief counselor. He’d never tried to console someone through the loss of a loved one.
Watching Lydia suffer and being helpless to fix it was the hardest thing he’d ever done.
She’d held herself together until they reached the apartment. Once they were safely inside, he removed their clothes and carried her into the shower.
That was where she lost it. The anguish pouring out of her tore the flesh around his heart. She cried so hard she vomited. She cried until she hyperventilated. Her pain was all-consuming, strangling her from the inside out.
It made him realize with gut-wrenching misery that when he’d faked his death, Danni had gone through something similar. She’d told him later that her grieving process had been so ugly that she’d drowned herself in grain alcohol for months. He thought he’d understood what she was saying. But he hadn’t.
He understood now. Every harrowing tear, each body-wracking sob, the immeasurable, yawning despair that rendered the soul forever scarred—he felt it all with Lydia as he held her in his arms.
Tucked beneath layers of blankets in the bed, he entwined his body around her and cradled her through the night. Eventually, her choking sobs waned, giving way to exhaustion and listlessness.
She didn’t speak beyond one-word responses, but he refused to rush her. She needed to go through this at her own pace. When she was ready to talk about it, he would listen.
Right now, his job was to take care of her.
He forced fluids and tried to make her eat. He kept a constant vigilance on the perimeter, overly cautious and paranoid about being followed. Everywhere he traveled, he chose lodging with the best security. This apartment was no exception. But it was no longer just his life he was protecting.
He was responsible for her safety, physical wellbeing, and emotional health.
Hefting the thick mass of her hair in his hand, he laid it against her shoulder, smoothing it, caressing it where it fell in soft waves of satin against her throat and chest.
From roots to tips, he gently finger-combed the strands. Over and over, with each rhythmic stroke, her eyelids grew heavier, the furrows in her forehead flattening out. The hitches in her breaths came with longer stretches in between until they vanished altogether. She was finally falling asleep.
“It’s really hard not to love you, Cole.”
The feeble sound of her voice startled him, but it was her words that gave him pause. He didn’t have to ask why she would try not to love him. He knew from experience that love was a risk, its longevity never guaranteed. At any moment, it could be taken away.
Her father, Shannon, Mike—everyone she’d ever loved had been taken from her. Maybe it was safer to avoid all forms of love.
But after eight years of being alone, he knew it was far better to experience all the ups and downs with a partner, to fight together, and spark joy in each other. Loneliness was never a better option.
“Do it anyway,” he said.
Her fingers twitched against his chest, her voice a thready whisper. “Did you just order me to love you?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Take your time. I’ll wait.”
Danni had said that love wasn’t a choice, and she was right. Love was a chance.
A chance worth taking.
She whimpered and cleared her throat. “It hurts, Cole.”
“Tell me what to do.” He pulled her tighter to his chest.
“This.” She melted against him, accepting his embrace. “Don’t let go.”
“Never.”
Not this time.
She fought the pull of sleep, but at last, her body won out and dragged her under.
Reluctantly, carefully, he slipped out of bed, stepped into the bathroom, and called Rylee. She listened as he updated her on everything that had happened since the moment he decided to walk into Lydia’s house.