Page 43 of Wild Devil

“L-Let her go!” she shrieks, her voice barely intelligible. I don’t recognize her, but, in a twisted contrast to Frey, she’s wearing a filthy white dress, her dark hair loose. Judging from the frantic fear in her dark eyes, she wasn’t here as some valued wedding guest.

Holy shit. Marco wasn’t lying. Human trafficking seems to be one of Michael Heywood’s premier side businesses. God only knows what that bastard has already done to Frey.

“Let her go!” the woman in white demands, shifting her stance to take a whack at me with her only weapon. Adjusting my hold on Frey, I raise a hand in surrender.

“I’m not here to hurt her,” I say. After wracking my brain for a suitable explanation, all I can come up with is, “What the fuck happened?”

“We don’t know,” the woman says, lowering her stick by a fraction of an inch. “They had us in the barn, and she got us out. The house was already on fire. I just want to get the fuck out of here.”

Some of the tension in my body loosens. So, Frey wasn’t inside the mansion when it went up. Thank fuck for that.

Yet again, I’m forced to admit that she smells nothing like smoke. Just blood and cologne and God knows what else… Damn it! Touching any part of her that I can reach, I keep smoothing my hands along her back. It’s only when I draw back to see her face that I realize…

She isn’t hugging me in return. With her head pressed against my shoulder, she stares at nothing, her face blank, her green eyes empty. It’s like I’m not even here.

“Frey? Look at me, baby.” I try to get her attention by stroking her cheek. Then I wave a hand in front of her face. Shake her gently on the shoulder.

Nothing makes her so much as flinch.

“Frey? Talk to me?—”

“Daze!” Ben comes from the woods, gasping for air as if he had to struggle to catch up with me. Now, I can comprehend just how fast I’d been going. Like a mindless fucking animal.

Being near Frey restores the sanity I lost the second I saw that fire. As I look back, I realize how irrational I’d been. My only option was to run headlong into an inferno to escape the pain of grief.

“I’m never letting you out of my fucking sight,” I tell Frey as Ben races toward me. “You hear me? Never fucking again.”

“Daze, who the fuck are you talking to… Oh—” Ben stops short when he spies Frey in my arms and the—not one, but now two women huddled nearby. The other must-have crept out while I wasn’t looking, also wearing a filthy white gown.

Ben takes one look at them and sighs. “Jesus Christ! You’d think by now I wouldn’t be surprised by what the bastard Heywood is capable of.”

“Just help me get them out of here,” I say, lifting Frey off her feet. The grip I have on her is so tight she would scream if she was in her right mind, but I can’t let go of her.

“Come on,” Ben says, gesturing back through the woods. “Damien managed to get a foothold closer to the house, but I guess it’s not necessary?—”

“Catherine,” Frey says, her voice a faint rasp. Lifting her head, her eyes are suddenly filled with life as they focus on the house. “Catherine.”

I think I recognize the name. “Catherine Heywood?”

Ben cocks his head. “That’s his wife, isn’t it?”

Frey doesn’t say anything else, and I don’t press her for more information. Instead, my arms cradle her as I turn back the way I came.

“Ben, I need to get her somewhere safe,” I say. “Now.”

“Okay. I’ll have someone look for Catherine, okay, kiddo?” he says to Frey. “Daze, you and one of Damien’s boys can take them to the warehouse. I guess we’ll have to make room for three ladies instead of one?—”

“Anna?” Marco tears past me, heading toward one of the girls. At the sight of him, she cries out. A heartbeat later, they’re holding each other tight.

Anna. “I think that’s his sister,” I say in response to Ben’s questioning stare. “He mentioned her before.”

“Well, shit.” Ben tears a hand through his hair and sighs. “Things just got interesting. Let’s get everyone back before the police show up.”

He rushes off to do just that, while I hold Frey in my arms, unwilling to move. She’s barely been out of my sight for two days, but…

There is no way I will ever let her go again.

FIFTEEN

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