“You thinking he bought the van with the cash?”
“Yeah.”
Stirling’s hands curled into fists, and his knuckles cracked. “Want me to take a look inside?”
“No. I’ll do it.” I hacked the hospital camera feeds and took down the ones covering the employee lot. Then I handed my computer to Stirling. “Keep the cameras off.”
“Will do.”
I stuck a Bluetooth receiver in my ear and lifted my chin toward his phone where he’d set it on the dash. “Give me a heads-up if he comes out early.”
“Roger.”
It was late and dark, so the lot was mostly empty, which meant I was less likely to draw attention from anyone leaving the hospital. The lock took me all of fifteen seconds to pick—I wasn’t in the mood to rush.
Fury like I’d never felt before engulfed me when I slid open the back door. Duct tape. Blankets. Zip ties. Bottles of what was probably something to knock out his victim.
Piper.
I shot off a text to Stirling with instructions, then I hopped inside to wait.
Greg finally came out, and I curled into the shadows until he’d settled himself in the driver’s seat. Without making a sound, I put the barrel of my Glock up against his temple and growled, “Drive, asshole.”
He yelped like a little girl, and his eyes flew to the rearview mirror. “Who are you?” he squeaked. “What do you want?”
“Fair questions,” I replied. “Drive the motherfucking van, and I’ll tell you all about me and what I want.”
Greg started the vehicle and put it in gear before slowly heading toward the exit.
“I’m surprised you don’t recognize me. Not the most thorough of stalkers, are you?”
His eyes went wide, but he tried to hide his reaction and sputtered, “I don’t—I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Come now, Greg. Don’t insult my intelligence.” My Bluetooth signaled an incoming call, and I hit the button with my free hand.
“Merrick put in a call,” Stirling said. “I’m sending you the address, but just have him follow me. Cash is watching the traffic footage and will scrub anything that catches our faces.”
I gave Greg instructions and a warning about what would happen if he deviated from them. But the guy was about to piss his pants, so I wasn’t really worried about it.
“I’m Deacon, by the way. Piper’s fiancé.”
Two hours later, I left a battered and bloodied Greg in the hands of a very discreet and capable hit man. With that behind us, I went home to fulfill certain promises to my woman.
Epilogue
Piper
Even after living on the ranch for the past three or so years, I still wasn’t super comfortable with the horses. The same couldn’t be said for our two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, though. Prue hadn’t met an animal she was afraid of yet. She adored them all, but her connection with our horses was special. And she wanted to see them every day, dragging me out to the stables to get her horsey fix.
“All done, Mommy,” she cried, holding up her empty plate so I could see that she’d eaten all the scrambled eggs and toast I’d given her for breakfast.
I walked over to the table and picked up her dirty dishes to carry them over to the sink. “Good job, sweetie.”
“Go horsey now,” she demanded, slapping her palms against the top of the table.
“Soon,” I promised, rubbing my hand over my rounded belly. “Your baby brother kept Mommy up most of the night with all his kicking. I need to wake up a little more before we walk over to the stables.”
Prue wagged her index finger as she shook her head. “Naughty brobro.”
I bit back my laughter, not wanting to encourage her. She got her bossy nature from her daddy, and I had a feeling she was going to take her pushiness to a whole new level once she settled into her role as a big sister. Instead, I reminded her, “You woke me up at night when you were in my belly, too.”
“You sure did,” Deacon confirmed, coming up behind me and wrapping his arms around my body to cup my belly. “I used to put my hands right here, and you’d pretend you were playing soccer with them.”
“Kick, kick, kick,” Prue squealed, swinging her feet in unison with her words.
Deacon pressed a quick kiss to my cheek before letting go of me to shake his hand in the air as though it was hurt. “That’s right, you’d kick my hand so hard, sometimes I wondered if it was broken.”
Prue’s dark eyes widened. “Nuh-uh, I no hurt Daddy.”
“Don’t worry, sweetie. Daddy doesn’t break too easily,” I reassured our daughter as Deacon strode across the room to unbuckle her from her booster seat.
My heart melted when she patted his face and murmured, “Daddy so strong.”
“Strong enough to do this,” he rumbled, lifting Prue above his head and zooming her around the room.