I’d reached for it, was about to open it, when he said, “I’m here for her, too.”

  I froze. The pain tore through me, gutting me.

  He was here for her, too?

  I forced myself to open the file, and ice ran through my veins.

  He had round cheeks. Blue eyes. Golden umber skin. There were laugh lines around his eyes, around his mouth. He looked like me, but he didn’t at the same time. I moved to the next picture of him. He had a little stomach, but not much. He looked under six feet. I knew Kai would have all the facts, but I wanted to see it for myself.

  His name was Gabriel Alfonso.

  5’11”.

  He was an engineer.

  There was a picture of him with two elderly people, my grandparents. I could see the resemblance.

  My grandmother was Black. My grandfather was white.

  My dad was biracial.

  There was a picture of him with a young woman. She was Black, too.

  A picture of him, her, and a younger girl.

  “You have a sister,” Kai noted.

  She looked like me, with the round cheeks, though mine weren’t so round anymore. I’d grown out of that a few years ago, but I couldn’t stop smiling. She had straight, dark hair.

  “They live in Boston.”

  I looked up at Kai, who spoke as he was looking at the file. “She goes to Boston University. Fluent in German and Spanish. She’s studying to work as a translator. I know that’s all in the file. She’s doing college and works part-time as an EMT.”

  “An EMT?”

  He nodded, a faint smile showing. “You get the medicine from your dad.”

  I looked over the other things in the file, reading up on my grandparents. They were both alive, both in a nursing home together.

  Gabriel’s wife was a music teacher. Her name was Cierra.

  “What’s my sister’s name?”

  “Angela. They call her Angel.”

  Angel. “Brooke will flip out. She’s not my only sister now.”

  Kai chuckled before taking another sip. “I asked Tanner if he wanted me to find his dad.”

  “He said no?”

  He snorted, which sounded so odd coming from Kai. “He told me to fuck off.”

  I put the file down, leaning back in my chair. “You? Brooke?”

  None of us was certain who our real father was.

  “Brooke and I are both from Anthony.” Anthony Bennett, the father who raised us.

  I nodded. “So it’s me and Tanner who have different dads.”

  “And Cord.”

  I frowned. “But you know who Cord’s father was, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did he have siblings?”

  “No.”

  “So I have a sister, and we don’t know about Tanner.”

  Kai nodded. “Right.”

  Right.

  I had a family—another family.

  Fuck.

  But then everything closed in on me.

  I closed the file and pushed it away. “I can never meet them.”

  “I know.”

  It was the same deal as Carson.

  “If someone else found them? Found him, found her?” My other sister. I looked at Kai, who was nodding.

  “I’ll set up a team to watch them,” he said. “They’ll watch from afar. They’ll never know they’re there.”

  God. Fuck.

  More people to love, more people to worry about. More people who could get hurt.

  “You said you were here about Carson, too.” My voice dipped low. I always thought about her. She was always there, always in the back of my mind, so there was always some pain. But when I let myself bring her to the forefront, really think about her, my insides tore out of me.

  It’d been six months since I knew I loved her, and that pain never left me. It never diminished. I would live with it. I’d have to.

  “She’s not doing well,” Kai said.

  My mind went blank, and I surged to my feet. “What do you mean? What’s wrong?”

  He stood, too, but more slowly. The old Kai was back, cautious and withdrawn.

  Fuck that. “What’s wrong with her?”

  He didn’t answer right away.

  That wasn’t fast enough for me.

  “What happened to her?!”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  CARSON

  I woke to a beeping sound, and the smell.

  I knew that smell, more than I wanted to.

  I was in a hospital, again.

  This was the third time in six months, and I looked over to find myself handcuffed to the bed railing.

  What did I do?

  “The first time was a car accident.”

  I knew the voice. I didn’t know the person, but I knew that voice. It was judgment, and it was a social worker. I’d gotten to know those people after the last two trips to the hospital. They’d been called in because the medical staff was concerned. They’d started to see a pattern, and that pattern was me self-destructing.

  This time, the social worker, or maybe it was a nurse—I didn’t know yet—was male. He came forward, sliding over to my handcuff, and he pulled out a key, opening it. “We didn’t know what state of mind you’d be in when you woke up this time. You woke up screaming the last time, they said.”

  I flinched, remembering that. I’d been screaming and yes, pretty hysterical. The nightmares never left me. I’d woken up in the middle of one.

  “I’m fine.”

  “No.” He laughed, rolling back a few feet on his stool. He stretched his feet out in front of him and crossed his arms over his chest, his employee lanyard tucked beneath. “You are most definitely not okay. You’re not eating. You’ve lost thirty pounds, and you did not have thirty pounds to lose. You refuse to give a work history, so I don’t know how you’re living right now, how you’re making money. You have an unhealthy pallor. You’re anemic. The first time you fell asleep at the wheel. The second time you collapsed in the grocery store. Do you remember what you were doing that caused you to end up here this time?”

  I could feel serious judgment from this one.

  “You fell from a ten-story patio,” he informed me. “You got caught on a patio two floors down, and someone was there. They pulled you to safety, but you almost died this time. I’ve read through the notes your nurses have taken, and all have stated that you refuse help. You were healthy up until four months ago, the time of your first collapse. What happened just before that?” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “I have a strong case to have you committed for a seventy-two-hour hold if this isn’t physiological.”

  I grimaced. “No.”

  “Were you trying to commit suicide?”

  “No!” I blanched at the thought. “I’m not sleeping. That’s it. That’s all this is. It’s nothing—the nightmares…” I couldn’t stop the shudder. My entire body jerked.

  I hated the nightmares.

  “Nightmares?” he parroted, sounding unconvinced. “This is all because you’re having nightmares?”

  He didn’t know what kind they were: people dying—my family, my sister, Jonah… That guy always came back, every night. Someone died every night.

  I was waiting for my turn.

  I didn’t want to sleep, so I tried to avoid it.

  You couldn’t avoid sleep permanently, I’d learned.

  “Yeah.” My voice came out hoarse. “Sounds stupid when you say it like that, but yeah.” I cringed. “I fell off a patio?”

  He nodded. “You should be dead.”

  Right. Then it would’ve been my turn after all. I sighed, because damn. Damn.

  “I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but there’s a nurse here who knows a relative of yours. She’s concerned, says this isn’t like you. She said you’ve always been healthy. There’s no similar family history. What happened? This sounds like something very specific brought this all on. Is this trauma? Were you attacked? What happened? I’m only asking because I am very, very concerned. You might not get caught by another patio next time. There might not be someone there to grab you.”

  The floor under my bed had opened up, and I felt everything being sucked down into it—a whole vortex, pulling me down.

  I knew that wasn’t what I wanted. How had I gotten to this point?

  He was right. I hadn’t been taking care of myself. It wasn’t just the nightmares, but those were the worst part. I could never escape them.

  I would die if I didn’t change something.

  “I know the cause of it…” I hesitated. “But I have to talk it out with a therapist. I need confidentiality, because what I have to say could get people killed. I can’t tell you what it is, but I wasn’t trying to kill myself.”

  He swallowed. I could see his Adam’s apple move up and down. “Were you attacked?”

  I didn’t answer that. “I do not have a death wish,” I said instead. “But I haven’t been taking care of myself. I will change that. I promise.”

  “You need to sleep. I can get a prescription for you. It’ll make you go to sleep.”

  I almost cried out at the thought. I was able to wake up from the nightmares. I wouldn’t be able to wake up from that. “No. Not that, but I’ll go somewhere I’ll be safe. I promise.”

  He stared at me long and hard before he gave a slow nod. “Okay.”

  I nodded back. “Okay.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  CARSON

  I was packing when I heard the door beep.

  I stopped, my heart racing, but no… That wasn’t possible. That was the sound of when I turned off my security system, and I hadn’t. It was a malfunction. Had to be. Or I was hearing things.

  “You moved.”

  I screamed, my bag and clothes went into the air, and I gaped—not believing who I was seeing.

  Jonah stood in my doorway, watching me.

  Jonah.

  Here.

  In my apartment.

  My new apartment that I’d moved into after I quit my job in Texas, because I didn’t know why I was living in Texas when my family was in Kansas.

  And he was here.

  Here.

  “What the fuck are you doing here?!”

  Okay. I had no chill button in this situation.

  He didn’t answer, and that’s when I clued in to how clenched his jaw was.

  He was ticked off.

  Well, that made two of us.

  “You left me!”

  “I did not leave you,” he bit out.

  “You told me to go!”

  See? No chill. He was here. I was here. I was pissed. He was pissed. We were having this out.

  “You had your brother take me home.”

  “I told you if you left, I wouldn’t stop you.” He started forward. “Because I loved you! I did that for you!”

  “I didn’t ask you to do it for me.”

  He stopped, his face twisting up. “What are you talking about? Look at you!” he roared, pointing at me. “You’re a walking skeleton. What the fuck have you been doing to yourself?! You’re anemic. I can see that by just looking at you, and FYI, that’s not a good sign. I just got off a plane, which I rushed to after my brother told me you were in the hospital for a third fucking time in six months.”

  He was really angry.

  And damn.

  He was hot.

  Something was so wrong with me.

  But he was here. Here. In my apartment. Where I was.

  He came for me.

  I hadn’t realized I’d been waiting, but I was. I had been. This was what I’d wanted all along. I just didn’t know it.

  A tear fell down my cheek. “I wanted you to come after me.”

  His eyes grew stricken. “What?”

  “I wanted you to come after me.” I shook my head, flicking away that tear. It was stupid to cry over this. “I mean, I didn’t know until you just showed up. But wait—are you here here? Or are you here to yell at me and leave again?” I shot my hand out. “Because I’m not doing that. Not again. I’m not the one leaving this time. You can’t make me go, like literally. I’m not getting a ride to my parents’ house with your brother, who was nice to me and that freaked me out. Neither of your brothers are nice. When they are, it’s not right.”

  He cracked a grin. “Are you serious?”

  “Yes.” Oh, man. I was. I really was.

  Not about his brothers—I was half joking about them, but I wanted him here.

  And he was here.

  I wasn’t letting him go this time.

  I wasn’t letting myself be taken away.

  What did that mean?

  I didn’t know.

  His eyes gentled, and so did his tone. “Are you okay?”

  I took a deep breath in, getting control of my emotions. “I will be.”

  He moved in, cupping the back of my head and tilting my face up to his. His thumbs smoothed over my cheeks. “You’re not well. Kai told me about your hospitalizations, and I almost attacked him. He should’ve told me after the first one. What’s going on? They started after you left us?”

  Oh boy. This was going to be painful.

  I reached up, my hands covering his, and held on. “I’ll be fine. I will be. It’s—it’s just… I haven’t been motivated to take care of myself. I’ve been depressed, because, you know. You. Leaving you shattered me, and I don’t know, I think a part of me just didn’t care what came next. But what came next were the nightmares.”

  He stepped close, his body touching mine. “Nightmares? You’re having nightmares?”

  I nodded, my neck stiffening up, and I could feel the fear moving through me, just talking about them. My body was conditioned by now. “It’s always the same. The hangar. That guy coming in, but it’s not me he kills. It’s my family. My parents. My sister. You.”

  “Baby.”

  A wave of emotion crashed through me, but this time, it was good.

  Healing.

  Hope.

  I could feel it creeping in, one inch at a time.

  “It’s been a really long few months.” I choked out a sob, and Jonah crushed me to him.

  He wrapped his arms around me, tucking his head down. “I’m so sorry. I would’ve come after the first one, and that’s on me—”

  I pulled back, tipping my head up. “Shut up.”

  “What?” He laughed, frowning at the same time.

  “Shut up. You blamed yourself for Melissa. You convinced me to walk away from you. You stayed away, and you were doing that for me. But enough. Stop blaming yourself for not being perfect. I could’ve reached out, too, Jonah. I knew you would love me. I know you do love me. I stayed away because…” I didn’t know anymore. “I’ll tell my family who you are, and it’s their choice. If they don’t want to risk it, I’ll stay away. But I can’t stay away from you, not anymore. I almost died this last time. I fell—”

  “I know what happened.” His voice was low. “I know the timeline. You need to go to counseling to stop the nightmares.”

  “I know.” I motioned to my bag. “I was packing to go to a treatment facility. This last accident woke me up, in a way.” I tightened my hold on him. “But I don’t want to do this without you. I love you. It never went away. It’s never gone away. You’re my one. I want to be with my one.”

  His mouth was on mine after that.

  He groaned, picking me up. “I love you. You and me. We’ll figure it out.”

  The love, the sensations, the pleasure, all of it swept through me.

  It pushed away the pain, the fear, the longing.

  I was in his arms.

  I would always be in his arms.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  JONAH

  Boston

  They had a big house. Big and bricked.

  Carson had offered to come with me. So had Tanner. Kai, too. But I didn’t want any of them, not for this. I didn’t know why. I loved them, every single one of them, but this was the other side of me. It felt right to be here by myself, to do this alone. ’Cause that’s how I felt at times—alone. But I wasn’t. I knew it logically. It was hard to explain, but here I was.

  Even Ezekiel was parked in a vehicle behind me. There were other guards around me.

  But I was here.

  I just wanted to see him, see her.

  I didn’t plan on talking to either of them. What I’d said to Kai was the truth. It was dangerous to know me, to be loved by me. This was the right thing to do for them. It was my way of protecting them, but they were part of me nonetheless.

  A car moved past mine, slowing, and turned in to their driveway. Two guys got out, carrying food. They were laughing. The front door opened before they got there, and my sister appeared.

  I leaned forward to get a better look.

  She was beautiful. Dark eyes. Yellow dress. Ebony skin. Her hair was pulled up today, in some sort of updo. She smiled at the guys. Both hugged her before stepping in. She paused, looking outside, scanning the street, before following them in.

  I knew they were having a party today. They were celebrating that my dad’s wife had gotten a promotion at work. She was the elementary school’s new principal. Kai’s PI had called with the information, telling me if I wanted to see my dad, he could make it happen. He’d made contact with a guy going and could get me an invite to go with him.

  I passed. Didn’t feel right meeting them that way.

  Seeing them this way was creepy, but at least I could see them. It was on my terms.

  I watched for a while as they welcomed more guests, and my dad hadn’t come to the door, not once. It had been my sister or her mom welcoming their guests every time.

  My phone buzzed.

  Ezekiel: That’s everyone on the guest list.

  Me: He never came to the door.

  Ezekiel: He might not be there.

  Yeah. He was right.

  I looked in the rearview mirror, seeing him and the other guards watching me.

  I should go. We should go. Carson was at the hotel waiting for me. I knew Kai and Tanner wanted to hear how it went. But it was a thirty-minute drive to the hotel, and I’d been in the vehicle this whole afternoon.