Deck’s eyes flicked to Kai who shrugged before coming back to me. “There’s no reason to look for him.”
A cold wave of dread plowed into me. No reason? No. No. I didn’t want to hear that there was no reason. What did he mean no reason?
Deck stood and came around his desk and leaned against it with his arms crossed, looking completely intimidating and yet he could be the Hulk and I’d still face off against him right now.
“Does that mean you know where he is?”
“No,” Deck answered calmly.
“No?” The word was like a sledgehammer coming down on my head. “No? No, you can’t find him?”
He inhaled a deep breath. “No, Alina. I mean, no, we are not looking for him. And, no, he’s not watching you and, no, he isn’t in town.”
I had no idea what Kai was doing because my vision tunneled on Deck as I shook my head back and forth, unable to believe that he’d given up on Connor. That he wasn’t searching for him. Making sure he was okay. Doing something, damn it.
“He’s your best friend,” I yelled as my arms dropped to my sides. “Why aren’t you looking for him? That’s your job. To find him and bring him home. You swore to bring him home. He told me you always bring your men home. Connor’s not home yet.”
“Alina.” Deck’s tone was soft and gentle, but his eyes were dark and narrowed. “He was home. He chose to leave. We did everything we could without forcing him.”
The tightness in my chest intensified. “Just bring him back. I don’t care how you do it.”
He sighed, his eyes briefly closing before they opened again and there was pain swimming in the depths. “Oh, baby, you don’t want that for him. And I won’t ever do it to him.”
I shook my head back and forth as denial slowly crushed with every word out of his mouth.
All I had left was this unbearable heated anger. I’d never felt so much anger in my life and it was like an overpowering reactive energy inside me that I had no control over.
“You won’t?” Conflicting emotions pounded and I struggled to hold onto some kind of sanity and not lose my shit on the one person who could help me.
He pushed off the desk and approached me. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but you need to. For your sake and that of the child you carry.” Deck stood in front of me. He was tall like Connor, so I had to tilt my head in order to look at his face “He’s not coming back. He can’t. Not as the man he is.”
My chest tightened. “No. No, he has to. He’s just lost, but we can find him.”
Deck’s eyes went to my neck and he frowned. “What happened?”
I touched the cut on the underside of my jaw. “Nothing. I cut myself.”
“I can see that. How did it happen?” he asked, his tone abrupt.
“I went to the house.”
“What house?”
“The boarded up one where Connor used to stay sometimes. I took the plywood off the window so I could get in and when it gave, the corner of it hit my neck.”
“Why the fuck would you go there?”
Some of the anger dispersed because Deck was looking really scary with throbbing temples and narrowed eyes. “I went to check if Connor was still watching me.”
Deck ran his hand over the top of his head. “Jesus, you can’t do shit like that. That house is condemned for a fuckin’ reason.”
“Deck,” Kai said. “Shut it down before she gets hurt.”
My gaze darted to Kai. “Shut what down?”
“You. This. The thinking that Connor is here or coming back,” Kai replied.
I jerked. “I’m not a machine. I’m not a goddamn machine like you Kai. My emotions can’t just be shut down whenever I feel like it. How the hell do you think London would feel right now if you left her?”
Some of that casual persona faded as Kai stiffened; his piercing green eyes steady on me. “That would never happen.”
A typical Kai response, which only pissed me off more. Before I could tell him off, Deck moved closer, his hand cupping my chin and tilting my head so he could get a better look at the spot where the board had jammed into me, knocking me onto my ass and landing on top of me.
“Don’t do that again,” Deck ordered.
“Then help me find him and I won’t have to.”
I hadn’t realized tears streamed down my cheeks until Deck wiped them with the pad of his thumb. “Connor understands the choice he’s made, Alina. There is nothing more I can do. I won’t force him into a facility. That has never been an option. You need to let him go.”
Jagged pain hit my chest and I staggered back into the door as the reality slowly descended that this time Connor wasn’t coming back. For weeks I’d had hope that he just needed time to figure things out.