Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 70516 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70516 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
“You have a point.” She looked over at me. “What…”
There was a banging at the door, and we all froze.
“Who…”
“Open this door, right now!”
I froze, right along with my daughter.
“What on earth?” Eddy asked.
“What do we do, Dad?” my little girl gasped, fear evident in her eyes. “Oh, my god. Did she follow me?”
“She might have,” I replied, dread lacing my tone.
“Who is it?” Eddy asked.
“My aunt.”
Boston sounded so forlorn that I couldn’t stop myself from hauling her into my arms.
“It’ll be okay, baby. I promise.”
Eddy pushed herself up, no hint of pain on her face.
“You.” Eddy pointed at me. “Go into the back room. And you, Bossy, come with me. We’ll answer the door and deal with your aunt.”
Twenty-One
I drive safer when there’s food in my passenger seat than when there’s a person sitting there.
—Eddy to Weaver
Eddy
The take-charge attitude gave Weaver pause.
“Go. Now,” I ordered.
Weaver looked torn.
“She doesn’t know you’re here,” I elaborated. “She just knows that Boston is.”
He looked horrified.
I knew he was.
His entire world had just turned upside down.
“Go!” I hissed.
Weaver got up and walked to the bedroom, closing it behind him most of the way.
I waited until he was all the way inside before shuffling my way to the door.
I opened it, and a beautiful brown-headed woman stared back at me with puffy, bloodshot eyes and tears coursing down her cheeks. “Where is my niece?”
I frowned at the distraught look on her face.
“Aunt Pippa, what’s the problem?” Boston said, coming up behind me.
Pippa started to run toward Boston, but I stopped her with my hand. “No. Don’t.”
Pippa came to a sudden stop, her body physically recoiling from making contact with mine.
That was a reaction I never expected.
“Don’t hurt her,” Pippa said. “I’ll do whatever you want. Just let her go.”
“I’m not being held against my will,” Boston said. “I’m here because I want to be. I don’t want to live anywhere near you anymore.”
Pippa sucked in a breath, her breath hitching partway through, and then she just collapsed.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she bawled. “I’m so sorry. Please forgive me, please.”
“What the hell?” Boston said. “Aunt Pippa, I’m okay. What is the problem?”
When Boston reached down to touch her aunt, her entire body flinched like Boston had burned her.
When she wrenched away, her shirt lifted, and I could see a smattering of bruises on her neck and chest.
I inhaled deeply. “Who did that to you?”
Pippa’s bloodshot eyes met mine. “I’ll give you anything you want. Just please, let her go. You can kill me. I’ll let you do that right now. Just please, please don’t hurt her. I’ll do anything.”
I felt him more than heard him.
One second I was standing in the doorway blocking Pippa’s entrance into Weaver’s house, and the next Weaver was pushing the door open and dropping down to his knees in front of his sister.
“Pippa, what the hell is going on?”
Pippa inhaled swiftly and looked up.
“Winston…”
Pippa’s eyes rolled back into her head in the next instant.
If it wasn’t for Weaver, she would’ve fallen face first onto the stone.
He caught her before she could hit the ground and picked her up.
“Find her phone and turn it off,” Weaver ordered. “Bossy, you. Not Eddy.”
“On it,” Boston said as she all but ran to the parked car at the bottom of the drive.
“Eddy,” Weaver said. “Get my phone. Call Denver first. Then Apollo. Get them both here now.”
I hurried as fast as I could toward Weaver’s phone that I spotted on the counter between them earlier and input the code I’d watched him input hundreds of times over the last few weeks.
Denver answered on the second ring.
“Weaver, what’s up? It’s late,” Denver growled into the phone, his voice husky and sleep laden.
“It’s Eddy,” I said. “We have an emergency.”
“Talk to me,” Denver ordered, sounding nothing like the charming man from earlier.
I told him everything.
“I’ll call everyone in that needs to know,” Denver said. “Don’t worry about Apollo. He’s at my place.”
It took five minutes for the first man to show up.
By the time that Pippa woke, Weaver’s living room was filled with men.
Men that immediately made Pippa start to hyperventilate.
“It’s okay,” I said softly, leaning in so that I was all that Pippa could see. “They won’t hurt you.”
“How do I know?” Pippa breathed through a gasp.
“I wouldn’t lie to you about this, Aunt Pippa,” Boston said as she, too, leaned in over the arm of the couch. “I promise. I’m not here against my will. Dad is…”
Boston trailed off, but Pippa had heard.
She cried out, threw herself forward, and jumped off the couch.
She looked around wildly and then launched herself at Weaver.
He went to catch her, to stop her attack, but it wasn’t an attack at all.
It was a breakdown.
“Winston!” she cried big, great, hulking sobs. “Oh, my god. You’re dead!”
“What is with all of you leaving hysterical sisters behind?” Denver grumbled.