Page 99 of Prey for You

32. The Way it Should Be

~ SAM ~

It was almost ten and I was on the phone with my lawyer when the burner started ringing. My heart immediately fought to punch through my ribs.

“Shit. I have to go, I’ll call you back.” I hung up the call before he could even respond and leaped across the room to grab the other phone before she hung up. “Bridget? Bridget, babe, what—”

“Sam.”

Her voice was quiet and small and that image of the little girl being ushered into the Police station by two massive men came swimming into my head.

“Bridget.”I breathed her name and dropped into the chair because the relief was so intense when I inhaled it was the first full breath I’d taken in two days. “Thank God.Where are you?!”

“I’m… um…” she swallowed audibly. I tensed again—had she gotten in trouble? Was she in jail? Hospital? Had something terrible happened?

“I’m at an Airbnb. Up in the mountains. I’m still in Oregon and… and I’m sorry.Sam, I’m so sorry. I-miss-you-so-much-but-I-don’t-think-I-can-drive-and-I-know-it’s-a-risk-but-can-you-come-because-I-need-you.”And then shesobbed.

My heart broke and I swallowed a lump in my throat as I scrambled for a pen and paper. “Tell me. Where are you?”

She mumbled out an unfamiliar address and I wrote it down, read it back to her twice because I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly, then the line dropped out for a second and I thought she was gone, but she was back a second later.

“—didn’t know if you could come for a couple days or—”

“I’m coming babe. Right now. Just… don’t go anywhere.Please.”

“I won’t. I can’t. Sam… Sam I can’t be away from you and it’s terrifying.”

I dropped my face into my hand, simultaneously grateful andso fucking scared.“It’s okay, babe,” I said hoarsely. “I get it. I’m a basket case. And I’m coming. Okay? As fast as I can without getting stopped by a cop. I’m coming.”

Four hours. Four fucking hours to get out to the middle of only-God-knows-where. And she didn’t call me once. I had no idea what I’d find when I got out to this place. I stopped letting myself wonder because my brain conjured too many things that made it dangerous to be driving.

I did manage to call my lawyer and tell him that I’d had an emergency. I needed to see a friend out of town for the weekend, but I wasn’t leaving the state and if he wanted to talk to me he could call. That coverage would be patchy, but I’d call him back if I needed to. Then I turned my real phone off completely so it wouldn’t ping and drove like a fucking madman, praying the entire way that God would turn away any cop that might care enough to pull me over.

Finally, after missing the turn onto the remote driveway in the predawn darkness twice, I finally made it up the winding, gravel road that climbed the side of the mountain until I found it.

I hadn’t seen it. She hadn’t described it. There was an unfamiliar car parked outside. There was every chance that Iwas about to bust in the door on a place full of a holidaying family. But somehow I knew. I couldfeelher.

I half expected her to run out of the cabin when I pulled up, but she didn’t. The door at the driveway level was unlocked—of course it was—and when I pushed inside, it was to nothing but a narrow stairway leading to the first floor.

“Bridget?!” I called, frantic. “Babe, where are you?”

Pounding feet sounded on the ceiling above as I took the stairs two at a time—and almost bowled Bridget off her feet as she came tearing around the corner on the hardwood floor in her socks.

She made a high, strangled noise when we collided, but I grabbed her up off her feet and held her to me so tightly I probably stopped her breathing. To my relief, she held me just as tight—her arms looping around my neck and her face buried in my neck.

“Sam…” she sobbed into my throat. “Sam, I’m so sor—”

I didn’t let her do it—refused to let her get buried in self-recrimination or whatever when all I needed was to be sure she wasokay.

“Are you hurt?” I asked as calmly as I could, though my voice shook.

“No. No. I’m fine.”

Lie.But I didn’t challenge her.

The relief of having her in my arms was quickly being overwhelmed byfrantic need.But I had no idea what she’d been through, or what had happened. I had to know if she was okay. Wait until she came for me.

I pinned her back against the wall, unwilling to let her go, but needing to check her and not sure where to go in this house that would feel safe for her.

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