Kai.
He already knew.
I swallowed over a knot and hit accept, putting it on speaker.
“Kai,” I choked out, the sobs right there, just at the back of my throat. I was going to lose it.
He was quiet a beat before, “Where are you?”
“Hospital.”
“Where specifically?”
“A bathroom.” I looked around. Two stalls. Both doors were open. And I was losing it. My knees were shaking, my legs unsteady. I was going down.
“I’m alone,” I rasped out.
“I got a call. Your name came over a police scanner with a GSW.”
Gunshot wound.
He was quiet again, and I could hear him taking a breath. “Jonah, are you hurt?”
Tears rolled down my face—big, fat tears—but an eerie calm came with them. I put the phone on the floor and hung my head over it. “Not me. Melissa. They killed my fiancée, Kai.”
He knew about Melissa. He didn’t know about the fiancée part.
He was quiet another moment. “What’d he look like?”
I gave him the cowboy description I had stored away, because in this life, with my family, you needed to know that shit. “Melissa wanted to go to the Valley, but I said no. I steered clear. I know there’s cartel there.”
“You got police where you are?” he asked.
“Yeah.” I looked over. They were probably on the other side of the door. “Two detectives came to the hospital. They want to question me at the station.”
“How are they treating you?”
“Like I’m the one who shot her.”
“You think they know who you are?”
A hard laugh ripped up from my throat, an ugly laugh. “Who the fuck knows. Could be my skin color. Could be because I was the significant other.” But fuck. Melissa.
She was dead.
Angry grief rose. I felt my chest tightening.
“Tanner’s in Kansas,” Kai continued. “He’s on his way to the jet now, and I have lawyers heading your way.”
I frowned. “You want me to hold them off here or go to the station?”
“I’d never want you to go to a police station, but I don’t think they’ll hold off. Go. Don’t say anything to them. If they haven’t figured out who you are, they will, and it’ll be like Christmas to them. I don’t care what they say to you. They can lie.”
“I know. I know all this.”
God.
Melissa.
Grief clawed through me, eating up one cell at a time, one organ at a time. I let out a deep sob, a noise that didn’t sound human.
Kai’s voice dropped low. “I’m sorry, Jonah. I know you loved her.”
“If this was about me…” I couldn’t keep going because I knew. I fucking knew. It was. “He asked my name, and then he shot her. She was looking him over, thinking he needed medical assistance. She had no clue. No clue, Kai!”
“I know. I’m sorry, brother. I’m so sorry.”
There was murmuring on his end. I heard a female voice, and Kai came back. “I’m on my way. Tanner will get there first, but I won’t be far behind. Riley wants to know if you want her to come?”
I loved my brother, both my brothers, and I loved my sister-in-law, but I was already shaking my head as he asked the question. “No. No. I—you and Tan. I’m not… She needs to stay with the kids.”
“Okay. I love you. I’m coming.”
I put the phone back in my pocket. Kai was coming.
Good.
Tanner was coming.
Good.
I needed my brothers.
But I couldn’t move. Not yet.
Melissa.
I’m sorry, Melissa. I’m so sorry.
Chapter Three
JONAH
They didn’t know who I was, or who my family was. Not yet.
I was in a back interrogation room at the police station when I figured that much out.
I’d been here a few hours now.
I was tired, and time had started to bleed together. They kept asking me the same shit. Over and over again.
The lawyers never appeared, but maybe they were here and waiting for Tanner. Maybe? I didn’t know anymore. I didn’t know anything.
Except that they didn’t know who I was.
“Mr. Bennett, why aren’t you speaking?” Detective Munoz asked. “We want to find this guy as soon as possible, and you’re not cooperating with us. You realize how this makes you look, right?”
I sat in a chair in a corner of the small room, and they had pulled up two chairs across from me. They were suspicious of me because I was Melissa’s significant other. That suddenly clicked, and a wave of relief crashed through me, followed shortly by a surge of anger because fuck that.
I mean, I got it.
They were doing their jobs, but that sucked.
I’d offered to give a physical description at the hospital, but they didn’t take me up on that. Maybe there was video footage from a phone camera? That would make sense, but why were they just sitting with me?
“Are you guys at least looking for her shooter?” I asked.
Their eyes jerked back to me, and their demeanor sharpened.
The male leaned forward. “You want to cooperate with us now?”