Page 65 of A Love So Wrong
"Oh, hell yeah," he rumbled into the crook of her neck. Tightening his arms, he molded her even tighter to his muscled frame. "We are on our honeymoon after nearly escaping a psychotic, Russian mobster. My God, Jade, you have no idea how much I need the downtime."
Jade laughed.
As he knew he would, his fingers found the hem of her shirt and began pulling it up. Lifting her arms obligingly, Jade let him take the top off, revealing her naked and ready for him beneath.
Clasping either side of his face as he positioned himself over her and in between her spread legs, she brought her lips to his in a sweet kiss that felt like napalm in his veins. "Then let's make sure we don't waste another second."
~*~
"She still hasn't picked up?" he asked, setting down his fork.
They were sitting in a diner in Crystal Cove, California, and for the past few hours, they had been trying to call their mother with no success.
"No!" Jade cried. He could see her nerves that had been unraveling steadily all day, begin to fray at the edges.
They had been traveling for about a week since they left Vegas and they were just now heading back south.
"The last time I talked to her, it was two days before we got married. It was late at night, but she responded to my text, and I decided to just call and speak to her," Jade's finger tapped a nervous, agitated beat against the table's top. The chicken and dressing she had ordered sat cold and hardly touched on her plate. "She sounded a little off, but I thought maybe it was just me because of all the stuff we were going through at the time. I thought I was just overthinking or something. Now she isn't answering Gideon," her hazel eyes looked at him in silent agonizing worry. "I have been trying since eight this morning."
Tapping his own fingers against the metal diner table, Gideon began mentally calculating the miles. "Ok, well, we're already heading back home, and we have about twenty more hours to go until we get there and…" he could see that she was going to interject, her deepening frown more than enough sign that she needed more of a solution. Holding up a hand, he stopped her and reached into his own pocket for his phone. "And you said Ebony and Gavin aren't picking up, right?" Getting a nod, he started to tap the screen, awake on his phone.
"I could call Taylor…" her voice hedged, and he knew she didn't want to have to involve Taylor in whatever this was.
"No, I think we need to—" the phone in his hand rang with an unknown number, but Gideon knew that area code.
They both exchanged a wary glance as he swiped the call to answer, putting it on speakerphone. Thankfully the tiny diner was deserted, the only two staff being the waitress and the cook, both in the back engrossed in a loud Asian drama.
"Hello, is this Gideon?"
The sound of Sheriff Grayson's voice made Gideon's blood run cold. Looking up, he saw Jade's face pale, and he reached out across the table to her, taking her stiff hand firmly in his.
"What's going on? We have been trying to reach our mom for—"
"I know,” Grayson sighed, his voice sounding somber. "Look, I need you two to come back down here, we…"
Snatching the phone from his hand like a viper, Jade sat up straight in her booth seat and held the phone close to her mouth. There was a hard-steely gleam in her eye and a sudden quiet violence that Gideon had never, not once, witnessed from her.
"Sheriff," Jade began slowly. "I need you to tell me just what in the hell is going on right now? Where is my mom, and what the hell has Ron done?"
If Gideon wasn't so damn focused on the sheriff's next words and worried about his mother, he would completely allow Jade's furious voice to go to his dick, but now was not the time.
"I had one of my deputies drop by earlier this afternoon and do a check on your house and mother, just as we have been doing ever since you guys left but…but the place was in shambles. We found your mom barricaded in her room crying, obviously in an attempt to protect herself from Ron," he breathed out the words in one rush. "The house is severely damaged."
Gideon could see the white stars of anger bursting at the edge of his vision. He would kill Ron, he decided, he would kill him and bury him in the front yard of his house so every morning for the rest of his fucking life, Gideon could stare at the one patch of rotten earth and smile.
Forcing himself to calm down, he avoided Jade's startled gaze and stared murderously at his phone, and asked what they both needed to know. "And my mother?"
"She is shaken and a little underfed from what the doctor and Bayview told me, but she is fine. It seems from what she told me, was that Ron had been progressively spiraling for the past few weeks. We have her at the rest home since she can't stay in the house how it is, and her doctor thinks she should not be on her own."
"If all of this happened this afternoon, why the fuck am I getting a call from you now?!"
"Goddammit Gideon," Grayson grumbled tiredly into the phone. "You don’t think I'm mad as hell either? I have been hearing lately how Ron has been out late drinking, and just the other day, I heard that woman of his just up and left him, saying she didn’t sign up to take care of no old lady. He's been in and out of the bars telling anyone who will listen how he's Henry's real son, and you stole from him. I had my deputy go over there today, once I heard Ron went to the bank starting holy-hell, trying to yell at Jim, the bank manager, about being the one who should own the house. Of course, Jim told Ron that the house is in your name and your mom's and to get the hell out of his bank. Since finding your mom how she was and the house in shambles, I have been busy as hell trying to get your house secured, your mom checked up on, and sending out every damn available officer to find that rat-bastard."
Gideon prayed for patience at the meaning of the man's words. "You mean to tell me you don't even know where he is?"
"We'll find him, Gideon, don't worry about that. In the meantime, we just need you two to come back home."
Standing up, Gideon took out a few bills from his wallet and threw them down on the table with disgust. "Oh, we're coming home, but Grayson, I will tell you this. You better find Ron before I do."
