Safe at Last (Slow Burn 3)

Months ago, they’d found another body with the same tag attached to the toe. Ari’s biological father. He hadn’t survived his beating. Would Gracie live?

He closed his eyes, unable to even consider the possibility. Were his worst fears of what had happened to her twelve years ago being realized now?

They had underestimated the enemy. Mistaken their silence and patience as them having given up. Now Zack realized that they’d simply been watching—and waiting—for the right moment to strike. To find a vulnerable target, since getting to Ramie and Ari, the two women married to brothers Caleb and Beau, would prove pretty damn difficult, given the fact that their husbands kept very close guard over the women they loved.

Zack was assailed by the knowledge that, just as he’d failed Gracie twelve years ago, so too had he failed her now. He hadn’t even considered the risk of him seeking her out, doing nothing to cover his tracks. Never had he imagined the lengths this fanatical group would go to in their effort to strike back at DSS.

This would kill Ari. She was so tenderhearted, and the idea that someone had been so grievously hurt because of her . . . Of course it wasn’t her fault. But she wouldn’t see it that way. All she would point out is that until she came into the picture there was no way for her past to touch DSS and those associated with it.

With a curse he reached for his phone again. Where was the goddamn ambulance?

He punched in Beau’s number, willing the other man to answer. He needed Beau to get the word out to the others. They weren’t safe. None of them were. Beau and Caleb would be pissed and they’d lock down their women so neither would be touched by violence ever again. They’d suffered far too much in their young lives. They’d seen more damage and hurt than any ten people would in their lifetimes.

“Beau, we’ve got a problem,” Zack said grimly when the other man answered.

“Talk,” Beau said, his tone immediately matching Zack’s.

“They got to Gracie,” he said, nearly choking on the words. “The goddamn sons of bitches beat her.”

“Whoa, back up. What the fuck?”

Zack closed his eyes in relief when he heard the distant wail of a siren.

“I’ve got to make this quick. The ambulance is almost here. The same people who beat Ari’s biological father to death, the ones who also tortured and killed her biological mother, got to Gracie. Same MO. I found her body outside my apartment. Tag attached to the toe with the same message.”

There was a horrified silence and then Beau’s explosion of curses.

“Is she alive?” Beau asked.

“For now,” Zack choked out, nearly beside himself with worry and grief. “It’s bad, Beau. I don’t know how bad. But she’s breathing. For now. Look, I have to go, but you need to let the others know. And Lizzie. God. Make sure she watches her back. I was with her all night last night. They’re obviously keeping close watch or else how the hell would they tag Gracie so soon after I saw her? Call Dane. Make sure Lizzie is safe. And make damn sure Caleb knows so he can protect Ramie.”

Zack hung up before Beau could respond. The ambulance was right outside his gate and he took his hand away from Gracie with a whispered plea. “Don’t give up, Gracie. Fight. You have to be all right. I can’t lose you again.”

He brushed his lips across her forehead and then surged to his feet so he could direct the medics to where Gracie lay.

TEN

ZACK paced the floor just outside the exam room they’d taken Gracie to. He’d firmly dug his heels in, refusing to leave her side until one of the nurses gently pointed out that they could do their job much quicker and more efficiently if he wasn’t in the way.

Then she’d guided him to the door and told him he could return the minute the doctor finished his assessment and read the results of her lab tests and X-rays.

He couldn’t even see inside, had no clue what was going on, and that sucked. What if she stopped breathing? What if she died, alone, with no one by her side to tell her she was loved?

He leaned against the wall, rocking his head back to rest, and scrubbed his hands over his face for the third time. His eyes felt like sandpaper. There was a knot in his throat that refused to go away. He couldn’t speak more than a few words before his voice would break and then fall to an emotional, unintelligible tone.

“Zack.”

Zack looked up to see Beau and Caleb a few feet away in the hallway.

“How is she?” Beau asked grimly as he and his brother approached.

Zack threw up his hands in frustration. “I don’t know, damn it! They shoved me out of the room and told me to wait. That was fifteen fucking minutes ago.”

Beau muttered under his breath and Caleb’s face was strained, his expression intense.

Then realizing that the two men were here in front of him, alone, Zack yanked his head up. “Where are Ramie and Ari?” he demanded.

“Safe,” Caleb bit out.

“Ari wanted to come. She was horrified,” Beau said, anger etched on his face and in the twist of his lips. “She was crying when I left her. Jesus. I can’t believe those motherfuckers would beat an innocent woman to prove some goddamn point. And what point?”

Caleb shook his head in disgust.

“It’s not her fault,” Zack said fiercely. “It’s mine and mine alone.”

“Bullshit,” Beau said. “It’s not her fault and it’s certainly not yours.”

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Caleb said. “We have to move forward and we’re going to have to take a more aggressive stance with these fuckers. I—we—all thought they were no longer an issue. They haven’t reared their heads since everything that went down with Ari. I shouldn’t have let it go but I just wanted us all to be able to put it behind us. Especially Ari. But now we’re going to have to switch tactics and go on the aggressive.”

“Fuck yeah,” Beau said. “We need to hunt these assholes down and let them see what it feels like to be used as a punching bag. Jesus. It turns my stomach to think of at least two women they’ve beaten. One of them was killed!”

Zack shuddered, his hands shaking. He curled his fingers into tight balls to alleviate the twitch but he couldn’t prevent the image of Gracie’s bruised, battered body from hurling through his mind.

“I’ve already put Dane on it,” Caleb continued. “Every single man employed by DSS is being put on this job. This agency’s soul focus will be on locating and taking down every single person who had a hand in this. It is our only priority.”