Rachel.
I could see her hair pulled back, and even in the dark, I’d know those bare legs anywhere. I’d spent countless hours in the dark worshipping and memorizing them, there was no way not to recognize them. The form of a large man was in front of her, and even though Mason and I had sworn to only knock the people out to keep them quiet, I knew if I got close to him, it would take an army to pull me off him.
Just as I started to slip into the hall, they stopped and he pulled her back a few steps. I moved just inside the doorjamb again, and waited for when they would pass me.
“Where are we going?” Rachel asked, sounding terrified. God, just hearing her voice was about to bring me to my knees. Over a month without her. Over a month of wondering if I would ever see her again. Over a month praying that I would hear that voice again. And now it was about to all be over.
“It’s too quiet”—a deep voice responded—“it’s not right. They have to be waiting outside that door.”
His men were outside that door, though they weren’t waiting. But I sure as shit was.
For a couple minutes, there was nothing. I held my breath as I waited for the signs of movement, and growled when I heard Rachel’s panicked, “What are you going to do?”
If he touched her, I would kill him. If he hurt her, I would do it slowly.
Not willing to give him the chance to do anything, I turned in to the hall and put one foot silently in front of the other as I got closer and closer to Rachel’s back. I barely caught sight of Mason creeping up behind the man when everything in me locked up.
What. The. Fuck.
I stared in disbelief, and agonizing horror as I watched my fiancée kiss him. I waited for her to fight him, or tell him to stop. Neither happened, and I couldn’t figure out if I was going to throw up, or kill him with my bare hands when they parted just a few seconds later.
Hushed whispers filled the hall, and I somehow found the strength to move toward Rachel when I caught sight of Mason creeping up behind the man again. Forcing myself to focus on Rachel instead of on the man I wanted to kill, I had to bite back a growl when I heard his deep command.
“Stay.”
He took a step back and Mason’s low voice filled the hall. “Freeze.”
Rachel froze and whispered, “No.”
I watched the man raise his hands and noted the rifle hanging from around his neck. But I knew if he reached for anything again, Mason wouldn’t let him get far. Knowing she would expect it to be one of the other members, I prepared for her to fight back, and holstered my gun before wrapping an arm around Rachel’s chest to pull her away with me.
“No!” she screamed and bucked against me, but I didn’t let go.
The man brought his arms to his waist and I retreated faster. “Mase, gun!”
“I said freeze, you son of a bitch!”
Rachel stopped fighting me, and I heard a loud inhale coming from her at the same time the man said, “Let her go.”
“Kash?” Rachel whispered.
My legs felt like they were going to give out when she said my name. “Yeah, Sour Patch,” I managed to say. “It’s me.”
“Kash!” she yelled, and turned to wrap her arms tightly around my neck.
Dying. It felt like I was dying for a different reason than I had over the last month. She’d just been kissing someone else. Pushing her back, I held her away at arm’s length and struggled to look at her. “Rachel, how many people are here?”
Her body shook with sobs and she blinked rapidly against the tears when she answered, “What?”
“How many people are in this building. We need to make sure we get them all before we get out of here.”
“Um, I don’t . . . Trent said there were thirteen—”
“Who’s Trent?”
She turned to look over at the man and Mason. “He’s—Mason, no!” she yelled when Mason hit him over the back of the head with the butt of his gun, his knee in the man’s back keeping him on the ground.
Pulling away from where I’d been holding her, she ran to where Mason was now zip-tying his hands together. I watched as she fell to her knees, pushed Mason away, cradled Trent’s head in her lap, and continued to run her hands over his head and shoulders as she apologized to him.
I was going to be sick. I stumbled back into the wall, and somehow kept myself vertical as I felt my world shatter around me. What new nightmare had I just landed in?
She kissed him.
She left me for him.
I’d spent over a month searching for her, and worrying about her . . . and within a minute of getting her, she ran from me to another man.
“Oh God. Trent, wake up, please.”
He groaned and whispered her name, and she cried out in relief.
“Rachel, get away from him. Now,” Mason demanded when I just continued to stand there, staring at them like a bad car accident.
She looked over at Mason, then me, and reached an arm out toward me. “Please release him and call an ambulance. Hurry, he’s hurt!”
“What the f**k, Rachel?” Mason looked up at me with a confused expression.
Grinding my teeth, I turned so I couldn’t see them anymore and spoke into the empty hall. Trying to get my mind on anything else. “How many others are there?”
“Seven,” Trent groaned from the ground. “There were thirteen here, but I took out five last night.”
Turning back around, I saw Rachel staring up at me with Trent’s head still resting in her hands, on her lap. She was crying silently, and even in the dark I could see the hurt on her face. But her hurt didn’t make sense. She wasn’t the one that felt betrayed.