It cracks and shatters, sending pieces of plaster across Flynn’s driveway. The man with the gun crumples to the ground, and the gun clatters against the cement away from his outstretched hand and toward where Flynn stands stock still with his hands still raised.

Flynn’s eyes dart to the weapon, and he kicks it away and closes the few feet between us, pulling me into his arms. “What the fuck, Rachel? What the hell were you thinking? He could have killed you.”

He holds me tightly, and I cling to him as he keeps his eyes on the man sprawled out on the driveway with blood trickling from his head. It mixes with the rain and slowly runs down the concrete toward the street.

So much blood.

My vision turns red as I watch it, and my stomach turns violently, bile crawling up my throat.

“Rach?”

I shake my head to clear away the image, swallow thickly, and pull away from Flynn slightly so I can look up at him. “I was thinking that psycho was going to shoot you and that I wasn’t going to lose you when I literally just got you.”

Flynn’s hands capture my face, and he kisses me harshly. There’s nothing slow or romantic about it. It’s desperate and hard, filled with all his panic and passion. He tears his mouth from mine gasping for breath. “Don’t ever do something so damn stupid again.”

Here I just saved his life and he’s making demands. “Or what?”

Something sparks in his eyes, a heat I wouldn’t expect in a moment like this. “Or I’ll bend you over my fucking knee and spank you.”

A low heat flares between my legs at his words. “I’m not so sure that’s a threat, Flynn.”

“Christ, I love you.”

He kisses me again, another frantic and needy molding of his mouth to mine, and I fall into him, letting him drag me away from where my mind wants to go—to what I just did.

But we can’t ignore that reality for long.

Flynn pulls away and bends down to check on the man in the driveway.

I peer over his shoulder. “Who is he?”

Flynn touches the side of the man’s neck as the rain picks up even more and thunder rolls through the night air. “A former client of mine. Dustin Kelly. Put a whole lot of money on some very risky stocks and wasn’t too happy with the outcome when the market crashed.”

“Jesus, so he’s the one who has been doing all this?” All the incidents that have happened over the last few weeks, the attacks on Flynn’s car, race through my head. “It had nothing to do with the site?”

Flynn shrugs and pushes to his feet. “Apparently not.” He turns back to me and rubs his hands on my arms as I shiver in the rain. “Run inside and call 9-1-1. My phone is on the coffee table. He has a weak pulse.”

I nod and race past them into his house, my bare feet slapping on the wet wood floor. His laptop sits open next to this phone with our messages on the screen. It’s so hard to believe that the site is what brought us together—not once, but twice. We were so stupid to ever let it get between us, even for a moment.

My hands shake, and water drips from my soaked clothes and pools at my feet. I dial 9-1-1 and make my way back outside.

“9-1-1, what is your emergency?”

Flynn rises from his squat over the man and approaches. He urges me back into the foyer of the house and out of the rain. “There’s no reason to stand outside and freeze to death. I can’t find a pulse anymore.”

What?

His words replay in my head. I can’t find a pulse anymore…

“Y-you mean…I k-k-killed him?”

No.

That can’t be.

I hit him, but I was just trying to knock him out. Stop what he was about to do. I didn’t think it was going to kill him.

He can’t be dead.