Page 97 of The Wrecked One

Julia returned a few seconds later, her tone tentative as she asked, “You good? He didn’t say something I need to knock him in the back of the head for, right?”

“No head knocking needed.” But it sure as hell felt like a gut punch.

We wrapped up the call—her with a plea for me to stop blaming myself for everything, me with a promise to try—and I tossed the phone on the bed and fell to the floor, unable to keep my shit together any longer.

I cried like I hadn’t since Mom was stolen from us, far too young. Her life gone, thanks to a heart attack, followed by a stroke during surgery. There was nothing we could do, no way to save her that time.

I relived every ugly memory I’d kept etched in my head in perfect detail, flipping through each page until something unexpected happened. I started remembering the good times, too. Despite the bad, and the pain, there was a lot of fucking good, too, wasn’t there?

It was the final memory opening up in my mind—the one of Mya telling me yesterday, without actually telling me, she loved me—that had me getting up again. Standing tall.

I went to the dresser and steadily lifted my head to meet my own eyes. And what I saw there was a second chance.

Although Mya had barely spoken to me all day, upset with the fighting-Hugo plan, she was the first to talk to me when I joined everyone in Carter’s suite. “You okay?”

Shutting the door behind me, I nodded and let her know, “I was on the phone with Julia.”

Not advancing my way, she simply nodded in understanding. Could she notice my bloodshot eyes from across the room?

“I spoke with Michael.” I directed that comment to Wyatt, since he’d spearheaded the plan for our additional reinforcements. “He let me know he’s helping us out.”

Wyatt was standing behind Gwen’s chair where she worked at the desk in the living room, the rest of the team practically huddled around our “cyber angel,” as I’d overheard Mason call her earlier.

“The McGregors have offered to help, too,” Gray disclosed before Wyatt could answer.

“Plus, Carter’s other doppelgänger, Sebastian Renaud, wants in,” Jack joked. Funny, but he wasn’t wrong. Carter not only loosely resembled Griffin on our team, but the Irishman, Sebastian, as well.

I pocketed my hands, hanging back by the door, not quite ready to join the crowded room yet. “I guess we need to make sure the plan works tonight or these guys will be wasting their SkyMiles to fly here.”

Jack’s eyes shot to me first, studying me as if surprised I’d cracked a joke. Maybe I was, too. He smirked and gave me a slight nod, and I wasn’t sure why, but that made me feel almost like I really was back on the team again.

I cleared my throat. “I miss anything?”

“Well, aside from Senior,” Gwen began, taking point, referring to Hugo and Sylvester’s father, Stef, “I’ve confirmed three other men are traveling with the father and sons. Two are bodyguards, the other is Hugo’s personal assistant.”

“One of them has to be our hacker, right?” I asked our resident cyber angel.

“I think so,” Sydney chimed in instead of Gwen. “My guess is our hacker ally must be undercover as one of the two bodyguards or the assistant.”

“How come this alleged ally didn’t give us a heads-up about the attack against Oliver and Mya on the way to the airport in Canada?” Jack pointed out, clearly not completely on board with believing we had a second cyber angel protecting us.

“Maybe the hacker wasn’t privy to those details,” Gwen offered a semi-plausible idea. “Or worse,” she added, wrinkling her nose, “the Sorens figured out they had a mole and took them out.” She turned her laptop screen to face the room, then reached around and zoomed in on the three other men she’d identified at the hotel with the Sorens. “If we assume our ally is one of the men here with the Sorens, here’s what I could find out about them.” She began listing details she must’ve uncovered after running their faces through our software for IDs, but I lost track of what she was saying when Mya abruptly stood from the couch.

She went over to the window but set her back to it instead of looking outside. She’d yet to change into whatever she planned to wear to the party tonight, so I knew she’d be stepping out soon to get ready.

Feeling eyes on me, I turned to see Sydney gesturing with her head for me to go to Mya.

As much as I wanted to join her, I was torn. What if the hope I’d started to feel back in my bedroom was temporary? What if the darkness took over and eclipsed the light that was fighting for space in my head?

I didn’t want to confuse Mya any more than I already had in the last few days, not until I was a hundred and ten percent sure I was good. So, I mouthed to Sydney, “I can’t,” remaining rooted in place.

Sydney nodded in understanding, then did what I wished I could and went over to her.

Averting my focus from Mya and Sydney, I caught Mason studying me. I had no clue what the man was thinking, but I knew he loved her. What I didn’t know was if he was in love with her, or . . .? Because that was a different kind of love, one I hadn’t understood until Mya came into my life. One thing I was fairly certain of? He cared about her enough to step aside, believing I made Mya happier than he did. And the fact he could make that kind of self-sacrifice made him trustworthy in my book.

“Is there any indication one of these guys with the Sorens could have better cyber skills than yours?” Mason’s question pulled me back toward the team again. “No offense.” He smirked.

“Some taken,” Gwen teased. “Anyway, it’s all good. I was the one who admitted this hacker is better than me.” She pushed her blonde hair behind her ears, then swiveled her screen around to type. “But no, I can’t find anything cyber-related. If our mystery ally is as good as I think they are, I shouldn’t be able to find a clue of that, though.”

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