Page 245 of Never Fall for an Angel

“. . . he showed up I my room with a gun. Why is he alive? I thought he was dead? And then Mila,” her eyes lock with mine. “Christian I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. He threatened to kill me. And Talia’s working with him—”

“Where is she?” I rasp, the pit in my chest opening up further and further until it’s nothing but a black chasm.

She looks like she might break down. Guilt crosses her features, and she grimaces through her tears.

“She . . . she . . .”

“Bells, tell us,” Levi says, rubbing her back in soothing circles.

Unfortunately, I’m not feeling very soothing right now. Not with my wife still missing.

Bella looks right at me, a tear slipping down her cheek.

“He took the two million Mila brought to save me . . .” she breathes “Then he took her, too.”

My wife has been missing for three hours, and I’m losing my fucking mind as the sun starts to set over the horizon. My chest aches with a hollowness I’ve never known. Like someone ripped my heart out and threw it in a goddamned meat grinder, then laughed in my face about it.

I’m unsure how to get rid of the irritable, edgy sensation slipping through my muscles, like death by a thousand cuts.

Why did she have to fuck up all my plans?

I was comfortable. I was good at my job. Helping the helpless. I never felt like anything was missing because my life was complete with my work.

Then she waltzed into my soul with her pretty gray eyes and that blonde hair and the softest heart and fucked everything up.

Now, everything is incomplete.

I’mincomplete.

Pain is easy.

Emptiness is what’s fucking hard.

I’m exhausted. Sore. Pissed off and growing more and more desperate with each passing moment.

Everyone is gathered around the house. Paulina helped Bella clean up, and they’ve been speaking quietly in the spare bedroom since. Ava is here, looking grim in her spot by the fireplace, and Levi’s been calling in favors left and right. I’ve even spoken with Logan, who’s gotten in touch with his FBI buddies in Seattle. I’ve searched her cell phone. The car. Fucking everywhere.

No one can find her.

Her fucking ring was left in the car. The tracker I’d had installed inside is useless to me if she’s not fucking wearing it. If I get her back, I’ll make sure she wears it to bed, to shower, to the fucking bathroom.

I haven’t received one text or call apart from the picture of Bella. I also haven’t moved from my spot on the front porch where Phantom sits at my feet, watching me with sad brown eyes while I pet his head.

On the outside, I’m calm. Resolute. On the inside, though, I’m on fire. Burning from the inside out with flames I can’t extinguish. I can’t shake the awful visions swarming in my head, like that video playing over and over again.

Mila is innocent. Whatever happens to her is because of me. Because I’m in love with her, and my brother will do anything to take that from me. Just as he did our mother.

His hate is potent, mixed with his delusions. He’s a walking time bomb. One I thought died when he lit that cabin on fire sixteen years ago.

Until my girl is safe and sound in my arms again, I’ll light the fucking world on fire, and not a soul can fucking stop me. Hell will look like a tropical vacation spot by the time I’m done with this goddamned state.

“You need to eat.”

“Fuck off.”

Bella, never one to be swayed, steps out on the front porch anyway.

“Doing whatever . . .thisis, isn’t going to bring her back. You should be out there, searching.”

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