“Take a breath. One day at a time, okay? You’ll get through this.”
Trees nodded like he didn’t quite believe him and didn’t want to argue. “Let’s talk about something else. What’s up with you and Tessa?”
“I don’t want to bore you. I don’t understand it enough to explain, anyway.”
“She’s pushing back?”
“She’s pushing me away.”
Trees scowled. “I would have sworn that woman loves you.”
“I thought so, too, but she’s never said that in so many words. And now she’s barely answering my texts. Something is…weird. Something is wrong.”
“Well, that’s definitely not right.”
“I don’t know. Maybe I pushed for too much too fast. I told her at Christmas that I love her. About three minutes after we got the all-clear to have more than a working relationship, I asked her to move in with me. She says she needs time to think. But it doesn’t feel like she’s thinking; it feels like she’s just putting daylight between us.”
Trees frowned. “So what if you’ve moved fast this week? I don’t think you rushing her is the issue. After all, you two have been eye-fucking and exclusive for months. You wanting to start a life with her didn’t come out of left field. It’s something else.”
“Yeah. I was at her place a little bit ago. She actually begged me to leave.” The panic in her voice had ripped at his guts. “And she’s been lying to me. Sure, about little things like her headache. But still, lying.”
“Any chance there’s someone else?”
Zy pondered, then shook his head. “No. I think it’s me.”
And he was worried they were one bad conversation from being over.
“Or…she’s guilty and she has something to hide.”
“I don’t see it.”
“Because you don’t want to. Keep pursuing her, man. You’ll never be happy if you just walk away from her. But while you’re doing that…look into her. Take her seriously as a suspect. Do your fucking job.”
As much as Zy hated it, Trees was right. Now that he thought about it, Tessa hadn’t just sounded panicked; she’d sounded guilty. “I don’t have a choice. I guess that’s priority one.”
And fuck waiting for the right moment. He was starting the next instant he saw her.
The following morning, Tessa pulled into the parking lot after another horribly sleepless night of wondering how Hallie was or even if her baby girl was alive. She tried not to think the worst…but her thoughts refused to center around anything else.
This had been the absolute worst forty-eight hours of her life. She’d give anything to have her daughter back—even tell the kidnappers every single secret EM Security Management kept. She just needed them to contact her with a demand.
As she pulled up to the office building, she found the small lot surrounded by police cars with flashing lights. Officers held the perimeter. A pair of suits prowled the vicinity, looking grim.
Something had gone horribly wrong. Tessa’s heart jumped in her throat.
As she tried to turn in, a uniformed cop stopped her. “This area is closed, ma’am. It’s a crime scene.”
Now that she was closer and could see beyond the police vehicles, she saw yellow tape cordoning off the area around the stairs to the front door. Zy was there, racing down and around the tape when he saw her.
“She works here,” he said to the guy.
The officer nodded, then waved her around the area and into a spot near the adjacent building, just beside the alley.
Her pulse raced, heart beating against her ribs as she climbed from the car.
Zy met her halfway.
“What’s going on?” she asked, staring between the busy parking lot and his bleak expression.
“A jogger came down the sidewalk about five thirty this morning and saw a trio of dead bodies piled at our door. None have been ID’d yet.”
Fear gripped Tessa’s belly. Dead bodies? Oh, god. Had her kidnappers decided the baby was expendable? “Anyone you recognize?”
She heard her voice shaking. Zy did, too, and cupped her shoulder in a gesture meant to calm and comfort. Apology twisted his expression.
No. No, it couldn’t be. Don’t let anyone have hurt my precious baby girl.
She dropped everything in her grip and clutched his arms. “Zy…is it anyone we know?”
He cupped her face and shook his head. “No, baby. No one we know. Three men, all late twenties or early thirties. But I was here shortly after the bosses arrived. I saw them before the coroner came. It was”—he swallowed—“bad. They were tortured.”
Her relief that Hallie wasn’t among the bodies was quickly stamped out by the terrible thought that whoever had killed the men might hurt her daughter next if she talked. “Oh, god.”
“Don’t cry, baby.” He comforted her with his embrace. “Don’t cry.”
“How can I not? They dumped the bodies here, at our office.” And Tessa couldn’t help but worry that was a message meant for her, to show her what could befall Hallie if she didn’t keep her mouth shut.