Page 40 of Crave You

“She’ll have gone to walk her anger off,” Erin says. “She’ll calm down.”

“Yeah,” Laurel agrees. “She knows Tilly is a piece of work, but she also knows you hate her. Just give her time.”

I want to do what they’re saying but it’s killing me.

“Look she’s not taking my calls. I get why after what she thought she was seeing, and I get that she needs to cool down or whatever. But I need to know she’s OK. Erin, can you call her please and just see that she’s OK. You don’t have to tell me where she is,” I sound like I pleading. Get me!

Erin pulls her phone out. After a minute she says, “Voice mail. Leona, call me back. It’s important.” She ends the call.

“What now?” Laurel says.

“There’s nothing we can do now, just wait.” Shawn says. “She’ll either call one of you back or she’ll come home.”

“And we can just let her run off again, huh?” I snap.

“What do you mean?” Laurel says.

“Oh, he’s having a go at me because I saw Leona this morning and that she was upset but I didn’t lock her in the basement or anything. I had no idea what she had seen. I figured they’d had a fight or something,” Shawn says.

“Even so, I can’t believe you just let her go running off while she was visibly upset,” I say.

“I’m not your fucking marriage counselor,” Shawn says.

That does it. The last little bit of calm remaining in me is gone and I stand up and stalk towards Shawn. He knows what’s coming and he gets up.

“Look that was out of order. I’m sorry,” he says. “But—”

I don’t know what his reply was going to be because he stops talking when my fist connects with his jaw. He swings back and before I really know what’s happening, we are down on the ground rolling back and forth punching the fuck out of each other.

I am vaguely aware of Erin and Laurel trying to pull us apart, but they are wasting their time. We are both past the point of seeing reason and neither of them is strong enough.

“Go get the twins,” Erin says.

Laurel must have done just that, because a moment later I feel hands on me and not the delicate hands of Erin or Laurel. Someone hauls me to my feet, and I see Shawn being dragged up by Lucien. Damien must have me.

I reach up and wipe the blood from my face. Shawn’s face is also bleeding but both of us have only superficial damage. I held back a bit and it seems Shawn did the same. We are both still angry though, and still trying to get to each other, so the twins keep us at opposite ends of the room.

“Does someone want to fill us in about what’s going on here?” Damien says.

Neither Shawn nor I speak, so Erin sighs.

“I think I have this right,” she says.

She tells the twins pretty much all of the story and by the end of it, my temper is up again and I am trying to break free of Damien’s hold once more. He tightens his grip on me. Then, I feel my phone vibrating against my leg.

“Damien, let go,” I say quickly. “My phone is ringing. It could be her.”

He debates whether I’m telling the truth and because I stop fighting him, he releases me. I am vaguely aware of Shawn still wrestling Lucien to get free, but I don’t care about some stupid fight anymore. I snatch my phone out of my pocket. Relief floods through me when I see Leona’s name on the screen.

However, my relief turns to cold dread, when I take the call.

“Hello Zander,” a male voice says. “This is Matthew Henderson. I have your precious little Leona here with me.”

“What the fuck have you done to her? What do you want?” I shout. “If you’ve hurt her, I swear it’ll be the last fucking thing you do.”

Everyone is looking at me and I realize they don’t know what’s going on. I quickly shift my phone to loudspeaker.

“Fucking Matthew has her,” I say.

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