Need Me (Dark Obsession 3)

Julianna’s phone rang just as they were hurrying away from the police station. She yanked it out and when she saw Carly’s name on the screen, she answered immediately. “Carly? What’s happening?”

There was a ragged breath. “Julie…I’m…sorry.” Carly’s voice was weak. “So…sorry.”

She stared up at Devlin. Something is wrong. Julianna mouthed those words to him. “Where are you, Carly?” Devlin had promised that VJS would take care of her—

“Don’t.” Carly’s voice had grown sharper. “Don’t come…here.”

Her heart pounded ever faster. “Carly?”

“Bitch…has a gun…”

Julianna’s skin iced.

“Blonde…thought she was you—ah!”

Carly’s voice ended in a pain-filled cry. The line went dead.

The phone almost slipped from Julianna’s nerveless fingers. “Where did the VJS put Carly?” She demanded of Lex and Devlin.

They didn’t answer fast enough.

“Where is my sister?”

***

Carly grabbed her stomach. She’d been shot…again. The blood was pumping out of her, the pain was burning like a knife inside of her, but she didn’t care.

Julianna would be safe.

She hadn’t led her sister into a trap. She’d protected her.

“Julie…won’t…” Carly whispered up at the woman. “Suffer…for me…” Not ever again. Not ever.

She was dying. She’d take all of the secrets to the grave with her.

“Dumb bitch,” her killer muttered.

Carly smiled. She knew these were her last moments. She thought of her sister. Of their bond, a bond that even time hadn’t been able to break. And she thought…

Of the man that she’d loved. Wildly, completely. Loved and lost.

If only…

Ethan was on her mind even as her eyelids sagged shut.

***

It was supposed to be a safe house. Sonofabitch…Julianna’s sister should have been safe! Devlin slammed his car door and raced around, but Julianna had already jumped from the SUV. She was trying to run to the building, but he locked his arms around her stomach and hauled her back. “The perp is up there!” He told her, holding her tight, hating that he had to use his strength to trap her. “You go running in, and you’re dead, too.”

But Julianna kept fighting him. “Stop it!” She twisted against him. “Let me go, let—”

“Let her the fuck go,” Ethan Barclay said as he raced up the sidewalk.

Lex jumped from his car then and ran to intercept the guy.

Ethan threw a punch at Lex when the guy grabbed him. Lex punched back, and they both wound up on the ground.

“Stop it!” Julianna shouted.

The men froze.

“Violence…so sick of the violence!”

Remorse flashed on Ethan’s face. “Jules…”

She flinched in Devlin’s arms. She wasn’t fighting Devlin, and that should have warned him. But he wasn’t prepared when she said, “Go, Ethan. Upstairs. Third floor, room 302. Someone hurt Carly.”

Something happened to Ethan’s face then. Fury rippled in his eyes, and his features twisted with a rage that Devlin had never seen. Ethan leapt away from Lex and ran for the building.

Devlin knew, with utter certainty, that if Ethan found Carly dead upstairs, he’d kill whoever else was in that room.

“Go after him,” Julianna said. “We have to!”

Shit, yes, they did. So they ran—him, Julianna, and Lex. Ethan was racing up the stairs and they hurried behind him. When they reached the third floor, Devlin only had a moment to see that the door to room 302 was open.

Then Ethan ran inside. “No!” A bellow of rage and fear and pain.

Her sister is dead.

“Julianna,” Devlin whispered, hating for her to see what was going to be in that room.

But she ran in. And when he followed, he saw Ethan on his knees beside Carly’s still body. His hands were shaking as Ethan reached out to touch her blood-covered stomach. Carly was too pale, the blood too dark on her clothes.

“Jules…” Ethan turned toward Julianna. Tears were in his eyes. “Help me, Jules!”

Julianna fell to the floor beside him. She touched Carly’s throat. “She’s still alive!” Her frantic gaze met Ethan’s. “Call an ambulance!” Then Julianna put her hands on her sister’s wounds. “We have to stop the blood flow. That’s what they do in the movies. Just put pressure on—”

Ethan’s hands covered hers. Devlin yanked out his phone and called for help. He saw the blood soak through their fingers. Julianna and Ethan had their heads pressed close together. They were staring down at Carly, and, as he stared at them, there was no missing their desperation.

Carly mattered, to them both.

Had the killer known that? Is that why she was chosen?

“A blonde,” Lex murmured as he came forward from the back of the apartment. Devlin knew he’d been securing the scene. “That’s what Carly said, right?”

Yes, but only Carly could identify her attacker. And Carly was barely hanging on for her life.

***

“I traced her phone,” Ethan muttered as the EMTs loaded Carly into the ambulance. “How fucking sick and twisted is that? I used my connections and I traced her phone to this place because I needed to see her. I had to see her.”

His fingers were covered in blood. His gaze was on Carly—and Julianna.

Devlin found that his own gaze was straying back to Julianna, again and again. He hated the fear that cloaked her. The pain.

“You know what it’s like,” Ethan’s voice was haunted as he whispered, “when you’re so consumed by a woman…you d

on’t want to imagine a world without her.”

Julianna turned toward Devlin.

“I lived without her for too long,” Ethan rasped. “Don’t make my mistakes. Don’t fucking let her go.” Then he was brushing by Devlin. He bent, whispered something to Julianna, and she nodded. A few seconds later, Ethan leapt into the back of the ambulance. One of the EMTs tried to push him out, but Ethan just pushed right back.

When the ambulance roared away, Ethan was riding in the back with Carly.

Julianna walked toward Devlin. Beautiful, but too pale. Dark shadows were under her eyes. Her cast seemed to weigh down her arm and he just wanted to wrap her in his arms and protect her.

I want her safe.

“I know who did it,” Julianna said simply.

“What? Baby, how the hell do you know that?”

Her gaze cut to the ambulance. “Ethan just told me there was more on that flash drive. We never looked past our video, but he did, just a few hours ago.”

And that would explain why the Smith estate had been trashed. Someone else had been looking for the flash drive. Julianna had walked in during the middle of that search, and she’d been attacked.

“I wasn’t the only woman Jeremy was blackmailing.” Her smile was cold. “Help me to stop her?”

He knew that he would do anything for Julianna. Devlin nodded.

***

Smith Industries had closed for the day. Or, at least, the place should have been closed. But when Julianna and Devlin walked inside, they could hear the distinct whir of machines.

Not just any machine…a shredder.

Julianna strode to Jeremy’s old office. It had been so long since she’d been there. It was like visiting a grave.

And finding the grim reaper waiting.

A blonde woman was feeding papers into that shredder, as fast as she could. A gun was on the desk beside her.

“Hello, Avery,” Julianna said quietly.

Avery Glenn whirled around. She reached out for her gun.

“Don’t,” Devlin warned her. He had his own weapon out and already trained on Avery.

Avery’s pretty face twisted with fury. “You—”

“He was blackmailing you, too, wasn’t he?” That was what Ethan had told her…that Jeremy’s assistant, Avery Glenn, had been on that damn flash drive too. A video of her and a lover. “I mean, I knew you were his lover, and I frankly didn’t care. As long as Jeremy was with you, then he left me the hell alone.” Brutal words. “But I didn’t know he was blackmailing you, too, not until today. I mean, you gave me that BS line about loving him, but it was just to throw me off, wasn’t it?”