Wicked and True (Wicked & Devoted 4)

“Y’all arranged that?”

“Yeah.” Hunter grimaced. “Trees reamed us out. We promised we’d do what we could to protect you in the future.”

Bless Trees. She hadn’t known that having so many protective men as friends would feel like having brothers. It warmed her. “Thank you. I know you have your own problems to worry about, so the fact you took care of me, despite everything I’ve done…”

Tessa couldn’t help it. Tears fell. After the day she’d had and the fact she’d barely slept in thirty-six hours, they never seemed far away.

“Hey.” Logan took her hand and squeezed. “Don’t cry. I know it’s been a long, horrible day. But Hallie is safe, you’re safe, and—”

“What about Zy?”

“What about him?” Hunter asked, but he looked at her as if he already knew the answer.

She was in love with him. But that wasn’t what he wanted to hear.

“I’m worried. I haven’t heard anything in hours. I didn’t think his injuries were life-threatening, but no one will tell me anything. My head is spinning with all kinds of possibilities. Did he have internal bleeding they couldn’t stop? Did he hit his head so hard that his brain swelled? Is it a concussion or a coma…or something worse?” Tessa tried, but she couldn’t carry on without breaking down.

If something had happened to Zy, one of the most joyous moments—rescuing Hallie—would be tainted by one of the most crushing, tragic events ever. She didn’t know how she’d ever recover. Honestly, she didn’t think she would. She would probably spend her life alone, rather than settle for less than the love she’d shared with him. She certainly couldn’t stay in Louisiana. She’d probably pack Hallie up, return to Tennessee, and start over. Or hell, maybe move out west, get away from all her memories—good and bad—of the past.

Logan cocked his head at her. “Are you in love with Zy?”

Tessa hesitated. They didn’t want to know simply because they were curious. These three never did anything without a reason, and less than a week ago, she had been strictly forbidden from touching Zy at all. Maybe they’d rewritten the contracts, never imagining that one of their operatives would ever fall in love with the office receptionist…but they’d probably frown on that.

“I don’t know what you want from me,” she demurred.

“I want the truth, baby,” said a deep, heartbreakingly familiar voice.

Tessa gasped and looked up. Zy stood in her front door, bandaged and battered but otherwise gorgeous, healthy, and alive. She could hardly believe her eyes.

She stood, her heart thundering. “You’re here?”

He nodded and sauntered in. “Yeah. And I’m waiting for you to answer that question. Do you love me?”

After a teeth-gnashing game of twenty million questions with the local police at the hospital and a seemingly never-ending battery of tests demanded by the ER doctor over nine fucking hours, Zy finally pushed his way out of the hospital and marched for the taxi he’d called. He was free—and he had an agenda.

It sucked big, hairy balls that the colonel had been forced to pause his efforts to save his daughter to make the local cops see reason, but finally after some coaxing and good-ol’-boying, the police had let Zy go. Apparently, his statement had matched Trees’s and Tessa’s almost to the last detail. The preliminary forensics, too.

His buddy had hung with him for a while, but Zy hadn’t needed hand-holding. Since he couldn’t do it himself, he’d needed Trees to do him a few favors, including bending the bosses’ ears about everything Tessa had suffered, then checking on her.

Zy wished like hell she had come to see him. But she had Hallie to worry about, of course. After all she’d been through, she needed time with her daughter. But he’d hoped she would poke her head in to check on him. The fact that she hadn’t sent disquiet sludging through him.

Had he hurt her so much in the bunker that she was ready to turn her back on him—on them—for good?

If she was, he had no one to blame but himself.

One thing he couldn’t put off another second? Calling his father. People were fucking dying because Phillip Garrett was a greedy asshat. He was going to put a stop to that shit once and for all.

Once he settled into the backseat of the taxi that smelled like old leather and butt sweat and ensured the plexiglass divider would give him some privacy, he pressed the contact on his phone he hated most to tap and waited.

His father picked up quickly, but his greeting sounded almost reluctant. “Chase?”

“Yeah.”

“This is a surprise. We don’t talk for months, then twice in the same week?”

“I thought you might want to know that your son—granted, the throwaway and not your beloved Ivy-League carbon copy—almost died this morning in a shitty mobile home in BFE, Louisiana, because you’re so fucking unscrupulous that you’re willing to take cash or favors or whatever the fuck you’re getting from drug dealers so they can use Abuzz to communicate. I’m sorry for you that they failed to off me, but it was close. Better luck next time.”