Page 98 of Catch Me When I Fall

Michael raised his chin, challenging me. “You cared for her even then, huh?”

“I loved her even then,” I clipped.

He blinked, his eyes wide as the air around us shifted.

I realized it the second I saw her bound to her bed. I’d loved her from the moment she didn’t back down from me. I’d loved her from the moment she looked at me with those gorgeous blue eyes, her curls wild and untamed. She had been a vision then, and she was my only focus now. If I didn’t have Carrie, nothing else mattered—not even Red Snake.

My head ticked to the side as I snarled, “You getting the picture now? Or do I have to spell it out for you again?”

Clearing his throat, he looked away and explained to me that he’d found a note on her door a week ago. She assumed it was one of her neighbors, and Michael went on to explain that he’d brought the man in questioning. Nothing ever came of it, and Carrie never brought Michael the notes.

“I’ll take care of it,” I told him, my body vibrating with anger, anger towards myself for dismissing them so quickly, but also anger towards Carrie.

She hadn’t told me.

And that was a goddamn problem that needed to be rectified—quickly.

“And you’ve ruled out Leo?” Jake pressed on the other end of the phone.

I was sitting in my SUV, parked next to Carrie’s little sedan, on a conference call with Dominic and Jake. Ash was still out of commission, sticking to office work for now, and Hayes was on a hunt. I looked over to her little, beat-up sedan and decided we needed to get her something better—safer. I added that to my list of shit to do for her as I stared up at the house, the setting sun behind it creating a halo of sorts.

“Leo wanted Carrie. He didn’t want to kill her,” I replied, staring down at her opened file, something I’d been carrying with me for the last seven, almost eight months.

“And you want me to re-open the background checks on Robert Hale?”

He was asking for clarification because, months ago, before I declared her mine, I didn’t want anything to do with her. I was trying to push her out of my mind. Now? She had been dealing with these threats in silence for months, thinking nothing of it.

My gut knew different.

“Yes. He was abusive to Carrie, and I need to make sure his past isn’t catching up with her.”

A tense, dark silence filled the line then.

“He abused her?” Jake growled.

“She told me everything shortly after you boys left.” I bit down to the point of pain, hating that she had no one—this entire time, my sunshine thought she was utterly alone in this world. I knew that if the Oasis boys knew how Robert had been treating her, he would’ve been dead a lot sooner. She didn’t think she belonged with them, though. So she suffered alone, just like she was now.

“Done. Anything else you need?” he asked, trying to focus on the task at hand, even though I knew this was eating at him. Jake’s father wasn’t a good man, having beat his mother and sister while Jake was forced to hide in a closet as a child.

“I also need Hayes to comb through everything on her father. St. Louis may have put him behind bars, but not every stone was turned over. Something’s off about him. We’re all missing something,” I explained, my voice still filled with anger.

Dominic, being Dominic, picked up on it immediately. “Check yourself on that anger, Gray,” he advised softly. “This isn’t your fault.”

“I pushed it aside,” I shot back, rubbing my forehead. My woman had been in danger—-this whole time. I’d hoped the notes had stopped, and when she didn’t bring them up, I assumed so. “She didn’t tell me.”

“Give her some grace,” Dominic ordered. “She has been through a lot.”

I ignored him, unable to contain the red in my vision. “Give me everything you have on Hale and her father in six hours.”

“On it,” Jake replied.

Dominic said nothing.

I ended the call and flipped to the info on Robert Hale. After everything, Carrie had told me, this wasn’t the golden boy these words painted him to be. He’d had a dark side, and despite her father being blamed for his death, I couldn’t help but wonder if Carrie’s ex-husband had any enemies.

Chapter 26

Carrie

---