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I’m in a new country. Entangled with a dangerous man. The sole witness to a murder.
Where I come from, young women don’t bow down to good-looking men who cup their chin as gentle as a kiss while they threaten their existence.
I grip the handle and push the heavy, windowless door open, stepping over the threshold. The loud thud of the door closing behind me is eerily final. The wind whips my freshly washed hair around my face, momentarily blinding me. Pointlessly, I try to tame a strand, tucking it behind my ear.
Pulling my coat tighter around my shivering body I look out into the dark night.
There’s no detective waiting out here for me. No vehicle with the word POLICE written along the side to let me know I’m safe, engine running, warm inside with a uniformed man waiting inside to escort me to a police station.
It’s a red Toyota truck. Him leaning against it. A single red rose in his hand.
He stands there, that corner of a smile on his handsome face. Bulky arms crossed over his massive chest. Nothing but a black tee shirt in this freezing cold night yet he looks as if he’s radiating heat. Long, muscular legs in light, worn-in blue jeans crossed casually at his ankles, and those heavy boots I remember from the road last night.
He gives me that crooked smile I’ve become so accustomed to even though I’ve only seen his face a few moments in this life, and he twists the stem of the rose. The blood-red bloom turns, slowly…
My life in his hands.
That’s what the symbolism feels like. What else could he mean by it? Showing up here? Bringing such a gift?
“I’ve made a mistake.”
I’ve got to get out of here now.
Unable to tear my gaze away from his face, I go to reach behind me, to grip that door handle like I never opened it in the first place.
Reading my thoughts, he shakes his head no.
“Don’t make me chase ye.”
He follows up the statement with a threat that makes my blood chill to ice.
“You’ll only make it worse on yourself than it’s already gonna be.”
Chapter Four
Bayne
Eamon gives me that look I hate. The baby brother one. The one that means he’s about to talk me into changing my mind.
“Don’t turn them damn pup eyes on me, Eamon.” I grip the wheel tighter. He’s the only soft spot in my hard world. “It’s got to be done.”
Eamon pushes his shaggy hair back from his face. White-blonde when he was born, it darkened as he aged but is already beginning to lighten from his hours fishing in the early summer sun. “But she’s just a wee lass. One of them tree huggers. She’s got no idea how things go around here.” He locks his eyes on me, light yet piercing, same as mine, blue with a hint of green if there’s a storm coming, same color as the island waters at their shallowest, just before they touch our shores.
The color’s been dubbed Bayne blue for our surname, as Eamon’s eyes are like mine and Dad’s and our grandfather. He and I are the only two Baynes left in our immediate family.
“Well, she’s gonna learn, then,” I say. “Isn’t she?”
“Not like this.” He shakes his head, hair falling back over his eye. “She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. She didn’t do wrong.”
“I’ll make it quick,” I reassure him. “It’ll be painless.”
“It’s wrong.”
“Eamon.” My tone goes dark, closing the subject. “You know how it has to be.”
He turns away from me, his focus on the view outside his window. Like there’s more than sheep and grass out there to look at. His next tactic in getting his way—ignoring me.
I hold the wheel so tight my knuckles go white. It’s not like me. To be like this. To second-guess myself and my initial instincts.
