“Jaime, what happened? Is she okay?”
Because somehow, deep in his heart, he already knew she wasn’t.
Jaime’s account came in gasps, broken by panic and short supply of air.
A Caravelle. She made him leave with Hannah. Kit was okay. Like she was on a mission. He was heading there now.
And then the three words that had Campbell shoving the phone at Dix and taking off at a run, hours away from being anyone’s knight in shining armor.
Facing him alone.
chapter
twenty-one
Better Man –Pearl Jam
FONTANA
“Well,there she is. Right on time.”
Fontana stopped at the edge of her garden, taking in the changes in the gaunt, balding man standing beneath her gazebo, framed in a crimson sunset glow, a color that haunted her dreams.
A violent gust ripped across the field, tugging at her coat and his grimy shirttail, pushing her back a step, as if Mother Nature were saying,Now, girl, think on this a moment.Her stomach twisted at the sight of Alias Quinn in a place she’d fought to transform from desolate oblivion into something real. Something beautiful and alive, a reflection of the changes happening within herself.
She and this spit of land had grown together.
This place was healing, and he’d only fuck that up if she let him.
Alias trailed his fingers along a beam, his hand quivering like an ornament on a Christmas tree.
Fontana smiled. Feeble. Aged. Unhinged.
This, she could work with.
“Where is she?” he asked, his voice as jagged as a knife tearing through a can. “Always putting yourself in front. Playing big sister. Protecting what’s mine in a way you never were. You hear me, girl? I want to talk to her. Tell her the truth about her daddy. Tell her the truth aboutyou.” He shifted his weight, one dirty boot scraping the ground, jaw flexing like the words burned on their way out. “For having me locked up, cut off from God and family. Well, that’s something I can never forgive. No matter what the Good Book says.”
Fontana’s breath rushed out as the scent of a distant fireplace settled over her like a hush.Mine in a way you never were…
He turned on unsteady feet, bumped into the railing behind him, then slumped against it. “You never knew. Never suspected. I don’t know why all those teachers thought you were the smart one. You couldn’t even see why I wanted to hit something every time I looked at you.”
The relief was so glorious, Fontana blinked back tears of joy.
She wasn’t his blood. She wasn’t hisanything.
And somehow, like wiping dust from glass, it made everything clear—a past she could finally see through. “I’m going to speak slowly so you understand every word. I’ll use little ones if it helps. Nothing over six letters.”
His face flushed, color rising from his ears until even his lips burned bright red. He stumbled a step closer, hands fisting. She knew he couldn’t catch her, but running wouldn’t serve her purpose.
No more running from this man.
“I gave you what I’d call a golden opportunity with the facility, Alias. Jail was on the table if Hannah and I had pushed. Your instability made that one tricky, but we could’ve made itwork. And then there’s door number three.” Reaching back, Fontana slid the Ruger from its snug spot in her waistband with the kind of confidence earned through far more time at the shooting range than the bastard across from her could imagine.
She’d been skilled enough years ago. But now, she was ready.
Because she had too much to lose.
She leveled the gun, arms extended, steadier than his had been since 1970. “You’re going to sit down until the police arrive, and you’re never, ever getting near Hannah again. Killing a man who threatens my sister—a man who isn’t my father—would leave me with less than an ounce of regret. You throw biblical mercy in my face like a handful of dirt. You always have.” She closed one eye, sighting him. “And I’m telling you, I’ve only got seconds of mercy left.”
