Page 7 of Assassin's Heart
Which she didn’t. Not right now.
She stared at the pocket where I’d tucked away her lifeline to her daughter. White teeth gleamed as she began to nibble at her bottom lip. I forced back a groan. Apparently it didn’t matter what the situation was; anything Leah did made me tight and aching. All I could do was try to ignore it
“Do you have family you can contact?” I asked reluctantly. Brooke’s father wasn’t still in the picture, I knew that much—after over a year of watching, I’d never seen a sign of any man in Leah’s life, thank fuck. I might’ve lost my shit long before now if I had.
Was he somehow involved with this?
I pushed the thought aside to examine later. “Do you haveanyoneyou can contact who can help you like I can?”
Her dark eyes snapped to meet mine. “I can’t get past the fact that I haven’t seen you for a year and a half, Remi, and on the night my daughter is kidnapped, you miraculously reappear.”
I shrugged. “Just because you haven’t seen me doesn’t mean I haven’t seen you.”
“Don’t remind me. You’re definitely not helping your case.” She brought her hands up to rub her temples. “You have to be involved with this. There’s no other logical explanation.”
The words were weak, though, without the biting sting Leah could add when you pissed her off. She was holding on to the idea because it gave her some knowledge, some control in the midst of a confusing, chaotic world. I recognized the signs and couldn’t blame her. She could hang on to whatever she needed to—as long as she came with me.
“Well”—I stepped aside, raised a hand to usher her toward the hallway—“if I’m involved, you’d better stick to me like glue. What better way to find your daughter?”
She stared me down a moment longer, brown eyes wary. And worried. When they dropped to the ground and she moved toward me, I knew I had won.
“All right,” she said. “For now.”
OceanofPDF.com
Chapter Four
Leah —
I didn’t really care where Remi took me; all that mattered was being in close proximity to my phone. To the only lifeline I had to Brooke. Ross would call, and when he did, I needed to hear my daughter’s voice. That’s all I cared about now.
I had been staring, unseeing, out of the SUV’s window for I don’t know how long before we slowed and turned into a winding drive blocked by massive wrought-iron gates. Remi pulled to a stop and rolled down his window, waiting for the camera at the gate to recognize him. A buzz sounded, and the gate swung open. My gaze was on the massive stone house nearly a mile away, nestled in the arms of a forest on either side, as he drove through the entry.
“I agreed to come with you,” I said, hoping he chalked up the anxiety in my voice to the past few hours. “I didn’t agree to be put under lock and key with your whole family.”
Because that had to be where we were. When your family now owned one of the most prestigious tech research firms, they could afford this kind of luxury. And security. I should feel safe behind those gates. Too bad someone far worse than Ross lived behind them too.
Remi let the car roll to a stop in the middle of the long driveway. “My family isn’t who you need to fear, Leah.”
“I beg to differ.” Even if I was starting to believe Remi might not be involved in Brooke’s abduction, I was a hundred percent certain his brother was fully capable of it. He’d kidnapped me before, after all.
To take care of his comatose brother. Remi had needed to be moved from the hospital after someone tried to finish the job they had started with the gunshot wound that almost killed him.
My head knew all that, but all I could remember were Levi’s eyes. Those eyes had been dead, terrifying. They’d frozen me from the inside out. Being raised by a tough man had given me a certain amount of bravado, but I’d known the first time I saw Levi that he’d kill me and not blink an eye. He’d simply needed me at the time.
He didn’t need me now. And Remi was taking me into the lion’s den.
Remi reached across my lap, startling me. When the glove compartment popped open, he rummaged inside and pulled out a pen. Then he grabbed my hand.
“Remi, what—” I yanked my arm back, but the tug-of-war was short-lived. Turning my hand over, he wrote a series of numbers on the back.
“What are those?”
Remi clicked the pen off and tossed it back in the glove box, then slammed it closed. “That’s the security code for the gate.”
I eyed the black ink on my skin. Sure, it might get me out of the gate, but what about the house? Their surveillance? “I—”
Remi slammed both hands against the steering wheel. I jerked in my seat.
