Page 110 of Breaking Free

“Piper! Get down!” he shouted as all three men raised their weapons.

She didn’t have to think about following orders or diving to the ground. Having three guns trained on her, something she didn’t imagine would happen in her entire life, paralyzed her with fear. Her legs buckled, and she stumbled forward, tripping over her feet. The impact on the floor knocked the breath from her lungs and choked off her screams.

Beside her, she heard a heavy thud followed by a string of furious curses. Piper glanced over and saw Morgan, his bloody face pressed against the tile beneath Axyl’s crushing weight.

“Drop the knife, you crazy son of a bitch. Or one of us is gonna put a fucking bullet through your head.” When he stupidly didn’t comply, Axyl viciously twisted Morgan’s wrist and slammed his knife hand against the floor. When the wicked-looking blade clattered on the tile, a black boot kicked it away.

Confused and still terrified with everything happening so fast, Piper scrambled away from the grappling men. But she didn’t get far. Hands encircling her upper arms had her screaming again.

“Easy, sunshine. You’re safe.”

No one in LA ever called her that except...

Twisting, she looked up into eyes the color of steel but also filled with concern. “Tristan,” she sobbed, launching herself at him. When her body slammed against his, her arms snaked around his neck, clinging for dear life.

“It’s over. He can’t hurt you,” he whispered into her hair, hugging her close as if he wouldn’t ever let go, which would be perfectly fine with her.

The hall filled with people as security and the police arrived, quickly securing the scene. Paramedics tended to Axyl, who had a bloody gash on his temple where Morgan had hit him twice and rendered him temporarily unconscious. He also had several defensive knife wounds on his arms.

They checked out her homicidal stalker, too. He looked like a gunshot victim, with blood covering him everywhere, but the police quickly cuffed him and hauled him away. The blood wasn’t his; it was all Axyl’s.

“What about you, miss?” a paramedic asked.

“I’m fine. Other than my wrist being a little sore from where I tried to catch myself when I fell, he never touched me.”

“Can I see? To be on the safe side?”

She shook her head. That would mean letting go of Tristan. “I’ll ice it when I get home.”

Gently, Tristan pulled her arms from around his neck. “I’m not going anywhere. Let him look.”

The area appeared swollen and was sensitive to the touch, but she had no trouble moving it or her fingers. She adamantly declined to go to the emergency room for X-rays, as theparamedic recommended, assuring him she would see her doctor if it wasn’t better the next day. Despite his unsuccessful attempts to convince her otherwise, he punched an instant ice pack for her before going to help load Axyl, who was the size of the two EMTs combined, into the ambulance.

If Tristan believed her wrist was broken, she had no doubt she’d be on her way to the hospital with Axyl instead of sitting on his lap, waiting for Detective Lloyd.

With her crazed stalker out of sight and Axyl safely on his way for treatment, she released her death grip on Tristan’s T-shirt. She smoothed out the wrinkles, calm enough now to ask questions. “How did you know we were in trouble?”

“Axyl wasn’t responding, which is always a bad sign.”

“I can’t believe it was Morgan. I barely knew him. He read the other part during my audition, but other than that, we never spoke.”

“Did he say why?”

“He resented me for finding a part so quickly after coming to LA. The rest was a hateful, misogynist rant that didn’t make a lot of sense. He was a bit of an oddball during the audition, but nothing like tonight. And I can’t believe Hunter would have kept him around for years if he was unstable. Something inside him must have made him snap.”

“I think you may be right, Piper,” Detective Lloyd agreed as he walked up. “Or he was good at masking his true self.”

She didn’t want to, but she sat up to talk to him, not leaving Tristan’s lap. They’d have to pry him away from her first.

“We don’t know much about Morgan Perry’s past before coming to LA, but not long after, he had a disorderly conduct charge, which was dropped on the condition of treatment.”

“What kind of treatment?” she asked.

“That usually means mental health,” Tristan supplied.

“We have a team at his place. I’m heading over there now. Did you know he lives in the same complex as you two?”

“What? Where?”

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