Page 8 of Extracted

Then he’d wring her goddamn neck.

“All right, all right,” Dare said. “I still think you need your head examined again, though.”

His brother’s lack of concern was nothing surprising.

“She’s in the city—Cali. I don’t think she drove from the hotel, otherwise I would’ve seen her on the road. She either took a car or some back exit . . .”

Or she died.

But he couldn’t go there. Not yet.

Dare sighed. “Did you send a picture?”

Dallas picked up his duffel bag and tossed it on the bed with force. Some of its contents spilled out. “Could you find a little empathy? Christ. I almost died. Gemma could be dead as we speak and you’re—”

“Look, I’m here for you, okay?” A hint of remorse laced his brother’s voice. “I’ve never heard you this unsettled before. If I’d known she was that important I wouldn’t have balked.”

Dallas swallowed down a protest. “Just find her, will ya? Please. And yeah, I sent her photo.” He disconnected and sucked a ragged breath through his nose.

The mystery surrounding the already obscure woman was enough to make his vision waver on a good day. Add in a thump to the head and getting tossed around like a baseball and his nerves were fucking shot.

Dare knew him well. Dallas never lost his cool. Very few things had rattled him in his adult years, and Gemma seemed to be around—or rather not around—whenever these things happened. Either he was uptight hoping she’d show up, despite the random pussy he brought into his bed several nights a week, or bent out of shape because she’d just left and he’d be without her pussy for god knew how long.

What a dysfunctional shitshow he was turning out to be.

He dropped into the desk chair and poured himself a drink from the bottle of rum he’d had sent up. Shoving a handful of French fries into his mouth, he forced his spine to relax into the chair.

Gemma had a strong hold on him, but he couldn’t blame her. It was natural for a man to want what he couldn’t have, and Gemma had made it painstakingly clear that she couldn’t be had for more than a night.

Once he found out for good that she was alive, he’d find a way to move on. After one more roll in the sheets. Just one.

He tossed back the golden liquid and then chomped into his burger. Sharp cheddar cheese hit his tongue, combining with the flavor of grease and pickles. He dove in for more fries and then reached for his water.

He had two missed calls from Lorenzo. Surely he’d heard about the explosion and now assumed the worst. Dallas couldn’t summon the energy to call him back yet, but he punched off a quick text letting him know he’d call soon.

The next big fucking disaster was that his contact wasn’t answering his calls. If something had happened to him . . . oh, hell. He didn’t have the capacity to go there.

His phone buzzed on the desk. Dare. He lowered the water bottle and swiped to answer.

“I’ve got her.”

* * *

Gemma squirmed under the bedsheets. The dark room squeezed around her, pushing the air from her chest. She closed her eyes and focused on the guided meditation coming through her earbuds.

Let go of the tension in your shoulders . . .

Whoever had come up with this track hadn’t anticipated someone trying to calm down after just blowing up a hotel. Well, she’d been duped into it. But that didn’t matter.

One really, really bad man was dead. Several others were injured. Maybe a few more had been killed. Charlene had assured her earlier that the hotel was already at half capacity and she had a special team that would make the attack seamless. Of course there was always the chance things would go south when someone opened fire, especially with Silas’s bodyguards on standby, hence why she’d gotten out of there quickly. Casualties were supposed to be avoided. Absolutely minimal at worst.

Except Dallas was anything but minimal.

He’d been a lighthouse in the darkest, stormiest years of her life. Almost six years of hell. Six years of not being able to live a normal life. See her family often or start her own. Heck, even hold down a relationship with a man.

Except Dallas.

She’d managed to keep him her little secret. He’d been her one joy, once a year.

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