Page 264 of At the Edge of Surrender

I love you forever, my sweet twin. Be strong. Be wise. Be free. Don’t be afraid of love. I can feel it waiting for you. All around you. And no matter what, know I will always, always be with you. No matter where I go.

Emmalee

A deluge of tears streaked down my face, my throat nearly closing off from the grief.

“Why didn’t she tell me?” A sob wracked from my body.

Years. She’d spent years knowing all of this and didn’t tell me.

Strong arms curled tighter, and Kane rocked me, that soothing voice whispering, “I don’t know. I don’t know. But I know that everything she did was because she loved you. Because she loved all of you so much. She was a fighter, too, Emery. A beautiful fighter, just like you.”

My head shook. “I wasn’t brave.”

I hid myself away.

Kane released a haggard breath, and he shifted me around to straddle his lap.

With his index finger, he tipped up my chin. “You fought when it was your time. When you had that little girl who needed you. You stepped up and you protected her. That’s brave, Emery. When you’re terrified to do something, but you do it anyway because you know it’s the right thing to do.”

Sadness tugged through his striking, harsh features. Emerald eyes awash in pain. “We both have massive regrets, and I wish I could go back and do it all over. Look at her and recognize her. Look at her and see what she really needed. But I can’t, just the same as you can’t go back and know what she was doing, either. But the one thing we can do is continue fighting in her honor. For women. For children. For all who are vulnerable. For that little girl who is sleeping down the hall.”

“I knew, Kane. Even when I ran, I think I knew there was no chance you were responsible for it. Each step that took me farther away from this house?” I spread my palm out over the beat of his glorious heart. “You drew me back.”

He gathered that hand up and pressed gentle kisses all over it.

My palm.

My knuckles.

His nose breathing me in as he gazed over at me.

“It made me sick for so long, Emery. Sick knowing that I was there. That I wasthisclose to being a part of it. But I know now…I know I was meant to be right there. Drawn through all the heartache and grief and crimes and regret to stand in that very spot. My only regret is that I couldn’t get the rest of them out.”

Sorrow pulsed between us. “Do you have any idea where they took Jana?”

Bleakness took to his features, and he hesitated before he gave.

Fully surrendering.

Giving all of himself to me.

Every facet of his life.

“I found the bastard she ended up with about a year later. Some rich, sick fuck who lived in Florida.” His big hand settled on my cheek and his mouth tweaked down on the side. “I’m so sorry, but she was already gone.”

I knew what he meant with the way he carefully phrased it.

She was dead.

Another sob ripped out, and I nearly bowed in two.

Kane held me up, arms cinched tight as he murmured, “I know, baby. I know. I would have done anything to stop it. I destroyed that motherfucker for it. He can’t hurt anyone else. I wanted to let her family know, but I couldn’t find a way without bringing attention to myself. Because I knew I had to keep doing what I was doing. Going after these monsters. I’ve been trying to track that bastard Tyke for years. I never could pick up a trace.”

He kept rocking me, rubbing his hand up and down my back. “He’s gone. He’s gone. Thanks to you and Emmalee, he’s gone.”

I could barely nod into his bare shoulder. “He’s gone.”

Kane held me that way for the longest time. Both of us processing through everything that had happened.

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