Because I’d never heard that tone from him.
Even when he threw the coffee mug across the kitchen.
That was when I felt it.
His tone, bearing down on the room as sure as if the ceiling had come disengaged and it was slowly falling, intent to crush us.
This was wrath, what I heard, what I was feeling.
This was end-of-days shit.
Bohannan did not like David being shot, for starters.
But it was more, and it wasn’t just all the other stuff this guy was doing that he did not like.
Bohannan did not like me sad or scared or hurting.
He didn’t like it at all.
And it would be the end of days if I didn’t get myself together.
“I’m just worried about David,” I said softly.
“I know you are. We all are,” Bohannan replied, and the tone was leaking out.
“Is Robyn okay?” I asked.
He glanced at Jace.
Jace peeled off, pulling out his phone.
Bohannan looked back to me. “We’ll find out.”
“Don’t burn down the woods just to catch this guy,” I begged.
He studied me, his gaze flicking down to Celeste, then he lifted his hands, palms up in front of him and said, “Both my girls.”
We flew to him, and pressed into him, and he wrapped his arms around us so tight, my ribs started aching.
He’d been so cool.
So calm.
So collected.
It dawned on me only then that she and I were on our bellies in a cabin, and he was out hunting. We were playthings, and he was embroiled in a literal death match that a madman was currently winning.
All of this just because he was good at his job of trying to help people.
His day and the last few months had been a hundred times worse than anything we were experiencing.
So, yes.
I needed to keep myself together.
I had my cheek resting on his collarbone, facing Celeste, who was doing the same.
We locked eyes.
We shared a promise.
And Bohannan held on.
Fifty-One
Red Poof
“This is a disaster.”
Will scowled at Kimmy (nothing to be alarmed about, Will had been scowling since he escorted Celeste home after school—another no vote to having his woman in the line of fire).
Celeste glanced at me, and her lips tipped up.
I stopped pouring chocolate fudge into a prepared pan and turned my attention from Celeste to Kimmy, who was standing in front of our Christmas tree.
“Why?” I asked.
She whirled on me. “I gave you detailed instructions.”
“Kimmy—”
“You mixed and matched!” she accused.
“Bohannan and the kids have favorite ornaments,” I pointed out.
And Bohannan was, indeed, a part of that. He had favorite Christmas ornaments. He had some of his mom’s from when he was growing up, and even some from his grandparents.
And they were on that tree.
“This,” she waved an offended hand at the tree, “obliterates my vision. Your house, gingerbread men and gingham ribbon. It’s smaller. More rustic. It screams gingerbread men and gingham ribbon. The family seat must be about splendor and majesty.” She counted them out by grabbing fingers. “Gold and cream and silver and subtle hints of glitter.” She planted both hands on her hips. “You didn’t even use the velvet ribbon I gave you.”
I failed to mention, since I needed all-new holiday decorations for my house, I’d hit up Kimmy (something which, it would turn out, was mostly for David’s edification, since I was never there, and now I was glad, because at least he’d had Christmas cheer around him where he worked in the days leading up to him being shot—it was a very thin silver lining, but I was clinging to it).
She’d made this her mission, and as was her Christmas wont, gone a little overboard.
Incidentally she “gave” me nothing.
I’d bought it all, and Kimmy didn’t sell Christmas cheap.
And FYI, it was Monday afternoon, the day after David had been shot, and Bohannan was gone before I got up.
He left a note that told me we’d have “presence,” Celeste was covered while she went to school, but she’d be coming right back home, we weren’t to leave the house otherwise, and I learned it was definitely an x that marked the spot before he scrawled his name.
So he left me with a kiss.
Kimmy got through the deputy at the gate because she’d caused so much of a ruckus, he’d called Bohannan who had let her in.
Now Kimmy was causing another ruckus.
“They already had decorations that they like,” I pointed out.
“Do I care?” she asked.
“I did the best I could to incorporate everyone’s vision.”
“You failed.”
“I—”
I stopped talking as my attention shot to Will.
This was because Will shot to his feet.
He was staring out the window.
I turned to look out the window.
And I saw Deputy Dickerson hauling ass across the clearing.
“Delly,” Celeste whispered.
Will took off toward the front door.
“Will!” she shouted.
“Come here, right now, both of you,” I ordered Kimmy and Celeste. When neither of them moved, I screeched, “Come here right now. Both of you!”
They came.
I snatched up my Taser and hustled us into the windowless hall.
We waited there, me standing in front of both of them, facing the great room, Taser up, finger on the trigger.
“Fuck you, where is he?” we heard shouted from outside. Then a repeat of, “Fuck YOU! WHERE THE FUCK IS HE?”
“Huh,” Kimmy said.
I turned to her.
She was glaring down the hall.
“I think I’ll be needing to kick some ass now.” She declared before she pushed forward with an, “Excuse me.”
“Kimmy, don’t,” I snapped.
She marched into the great room and disappeared right, heading toward the front door.
“Get your hands off me! Get your goddamned hands off me!” Silence and, “So busy gettin’ your rocks off with a TV star, you can’t catch a killer, and my boy’s caught in the crossfire!”
I looked to Celeste.
“Mr. Ashbrook,” she whispered.
David’s shitty dad.
We crept into the great room, and standing at the side, stacked on top of each other, like two of the Scooby Doo gang, we peered out the front window.
A man my age was stomach to the pine needles, kicking and fighting, Dickerson’s knee to his back. The deputy had one of the man’s arms in his grip. He and another officer were struggling to get his second hand behind his back to cuff him. Will was crouched, holding down his thighs.
“Yeah. Mr. Ashbrook,” Celeste confirmed.
“Get off me! Get the fuck OFF ME!” he shouted.
They got him cuffed and then did that cop move where they jerked him to his feet using his arms.
No sooner was he upright than Kimmy moved in and smacked him across the face.
I gasped.
Celeste snorted.
He shook his head in surprise.
She smacked him again.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.