11

11

KADE

When I bought this place and realised I had too much money that could get swallowed up by the system if I died, I made a will. When my untimely passing happens, I’ll split half my money between my family. They can argue among them who gets what amount.

The other half will go to Stacey, along with the ownership of the dogs, my Stirling apartment, and my bike and car. She already has a few of my accounts that Barry gave her when they moved to America.

My savings – all thirty million dollars hidden in a separate bank account – goes to Barry. It means college fully paid for his daughter and any future kids, and he’ll have full control of my business and all guards.

Base is basically richer than royalty, and Dez is probably going to marry Tylar, who’s also filthy rich from her parents owning an architecture empire. They don’t need my shit.

I sit at the kitchen counter, “Cities” by Toby Mai (featuring Two Feet) echoing through the surround-sound speakers all over the house, and watch my phone screen – the dogs are running wild in the backyard, and the manor workers are trying to catch them. They look happy, barking and rolling around with each other.

I miss them.

A message pops up, and I sigh.

Bernadette: Kill her this time, do you understand? I can see through CCTV and track you with the bug in your phone and hear you through the earpiece – you can’t try any funny business.

Bernadette: A deal is a deal. I will clear your files of any criminal activity, and you’ll be free. Just get rid of her.

You’d think she’d want me to ask about her daughter – why does my family have Cassie in the lodge and why is she still breathing? My dad is there, so I’m shocked Cassie isn’t buried in a shallow grave by now given his impatience and lack of medication.

Stacey messages me, and it shifts my mood completely. My heart races in my ears. All she’s sent is her location. A little blue dot on a map, moving down the A9. I keep the app open and grab a glass of water, downing some of it and rushing to my bathroom to check my face and hair.

There’s no fixing the latter; it’s too long and wavy, and my face is ripped apart with bruises, little cuts from Jason hitting me and the hideous scar that’ll probably scare her.

I don’t want to scare her.

The instant twisting in my gut has me vomiting into the toilet bowl – my eighth time being sick today, I think. It’s been happening for a while, but it goes away after a bit or I push through the nausea.

Before I leave, I brush my teeth then settle at my kitchen counter again with a pen and paper. It’s addressed to everyone, I guess. I scribble down words that have me pausing every few paragraphs, and when I write to Stacey, the ink runs out.

Must be fate.

I don’t have time to find another pen, since Stacey is close to the location.

She won’t be interested in what I was going to say anyway.

I leave the note sitting on the counter and turn out the lights, fixing my phone onto the handlebars of my bike and pulling my gloves on. Material over my mouth, I shove the helmet on and press the button on my app to open my garage door.

As I drive off, I watch her little blue dot draw closer to me.

It shouldn’t make me more nervous, but it does. Anxiety is clawing at my chest, begging to rip me to shreds. I slow down, speed up, wind between cars, the cracked skin of my knuckles rubbing against my gloves.

Twenty minutes later, she pulls into a gas station not far from me. I speed up to catch her, pulling in and stopping beside one of the tanks to fill up.

A black SUV sits alone in the station. One of mine. She must’ve snuck off under everyone’s noses, because if they knew she was here, I’d be toast by now.

Remembering the look on their faces when they rushed to Stacey after I took that shot, they truly believe I want to kill her, that I’ve gone off the deep end. Even my own brother beat me up for it.

They no longer trust me.

I fix my leather jacket and keep my helmet on as I head into the building to pay. My pulse pounds when I see her. Like my teenage crush from back in the day returns and I’m unable to even form a word in front of her – to look her in the eye without imagining us spending the rest of our lives together. My hands shake, and I fist them.

For over a year, I’ve imagined the conversation we’d have. Twelve months of waiting, finding different ways to get to her. Fifty-two weeks of torture while Barry and my team kept her safe. It all boils down to this moment, when she glances over her shoulder and gives me a tight smile out of friendliness, not knowing it’s me.

The one who shot at her.

The ex-boyfriend who would burn the world down for her.

The piece of shit who could never fall out of love with her.

I nearly drop to my fucking knees, staring at her little dimple and the freckles dusting her cheeks and nose. She’s truly a work of art. A masterpiece. And I’m proud to say that I was her first love.

She turns away from me to speak to the cashier, exchanging pleasantries while she pays. I flex my fingers, roll my jaw to hype myself up to close the distance and walk towards her.

Regretfully, I need to scare Stacey again and make her hurry up and get to our meeting place. It won’t be long until Barry realises she’s gone and hunts her down. We need privacy. We need a few fucking minutes for me to get everything off my chest.

The closer I get, the more I want to drown in her. All of her. I want to wrap my arms around her and hide from this fucked-up world. I want to say I’m sorry for everything and beg her to run away with me.

As soon as I’m behind her, I pause. Even through my helmet, I can smell her shampoo. The top of her head reaches just under my chin, and all the memories of me holding her from behind flash before my eyes.

“Thank you,” she says to the cashier, taking her change.

Fuck. Her voice sounds even better than it did on the phone. Am I so far gone that hearing her speak makes me feel like a pubescent teen? I have goosebumps, for fuck’s sake.

“Anything else?” the cashier asks, her eyes skimming me then moving back to Stacey.

“No. Thank you.”

I push myself forward despite my nerves shattering, keeping my visor down as I lean my elbows on the desk beside her. She bumps into me when she pockets the change, and my heart stops from the contact.

“Oh, sorry.”

With a deadly slowness, I turn my head to look at her. She can’t see me, but I can see her.

I can see the winter wonderland within a forest in her eyes, her long lashes touched with mascara, the lip balm coating her lips, her hair falling down her back in soft waves that make me want to brush my fingers through them.

Her skin has always had a slight tan, freckles scattered across every inch, and her lips, those full fucking lips, part as she stares at her reflection in the blacked-out visor.

My hands bunch on the counter, the leather gloves crunching, aching to push a lock of hair behind her ear, to flip up my visor and force her to accept an apology right here and now.

Not that an apology is even close to being enough, but at this point, it’s all I’ve got. I don’t have the privilege of time to do everything I can to win her back. I can’t grovel at her feet for months, years, a lifetime.

I won’t kiss her. I can’t even imagine kissing her without breaking her. The thought of touching her, making her unravel beneath me, is unrealistic. Bernadette and her team have well and truly fucked that all out of me.

I’m so sorry, Freckles, I want to say. For everything you’ve been through. By my hand and others’.

But everything I do, Bernadette can hear and see right now.

Instead, I tilt my head at her as the cashier asks me if she can help me. My stomach twists, the dire need to vomit making me dizzy, but I ignore it. Ignore the layer of sweat in my hair, the double vision. The intense feeling of needing to sit the fuck down.

Shit.

Stacey blinks with realisation, trying to take careful steps as she backs away without causing any alarm. The cashier asks me again, but I twist and lean my elbows on the counter and watch my girl turn the whitest shade of white.

She’s taken three steps from me. I can clear that distance in one.

I want her to stay, even if she’s unsure of who I am or what my true intentions might be when she meets me. Having her so close makes me want to fucking live.

I haven’t wanted to live for such a long, shitty time.

When I left for Russia a year ago, all I could think about was her. In fact, since I met her at fifteen, I’ve not had one day where she hasn’t been on my mind.

I let my impulsiveness win, and I reach forward to tuck a loose curl behind her ear, but she pulls back on a rushed breath before I make contact. Her eyes widen, and she turns and runs to the car, not bothering to pick up the shelf of fruit she knocks over in the process.

After setting notes on the counter to pay for my fuel, I follow her out with slow steps, ignoring the cashier asking if there’s a problem. Stacey hurriedly opens and locks the car door, steps on the gas and speeds out of the station.

Good girl.

It takes me less than three minutes to catch up to her on my motorbike.

While she goes as fast as she can, I stay on her tail. I need her terrified enough that Bernadette believes all of this until the very last minute. I need as much time as possible before she realises I’m aborting the mission.

My breathing halts when she nearly misses a turn on the road.

Fucking hell, Freckles. Drive carefully.

I speed up, approaching her right side. For dramatic effect, because she’s only doing fifty on a road with a limit of fucking seventy, I pull out my gun and keep it in view as I slide up beside her window and aim right at her.

She looks to the side, and her eyes widen.

She abruptly takes the next turn.

Good. We were supposed to meet on this road anyway.

She’s still as terrible a driver as ever. But no matter how fast she goes, I match the speed, mocking her every time I turn my head to look at her. She keeps her eyes forward, gripping the steering wheel for dear life.

Finally, she slows down, and we both pull over at our meeting place, before she’s opening the car door without pausing. Instead of a hello, she slams the door behind her. “Get this over with.”

I swallow and turn off the bike’s engine, my eyes finding the cameras Bernadette set up trained on the car park for a split second before I look back at her.

She crosses her arms, and it kills me that she’s holding back tears. She’s trembling. I can see the quake in her knees and how stiff her entire body is.

I pull up the visor, and she doesn’t give me any eye contact; she just stares at my hands as one lifts to aim the gun at her, the other pushing into the space of my helmet to press the button in my ear.

Fuck, forgive me.

Fucking please forgive me, Stacey.

“I have her,” I say in a firm tone. The uncontrollable blinking starts, a layer of sweat forming on my face. “She’s right in front of me.”