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Chapter Twelve
Dalton leaned back in his chair in his office and put his feet up. He was bone tired. They had finally gotten the fire under control and let it burn out.
Max was doing well. The hospital was keeping him overnight for observation. He was lucky to only suffer from a slight fracture. No surgery was needed, but he’d be in a soft cast for some weeks.
Dalton reached for his cell. He’d hadn’t had a chance to check it since his day had gone to hell and back.
Ringing filled the air. Dalton glanced at the screen and saw his brother’s name.
“Yo,” he answered, running a hand along his face. He pulled his hand back and saw black soot on it. He didn’t even want to know what he looked like.
“When were you going to tell me about Anya?” Dallas’s gruff voice came onto the line. He had always been the more serious of the two. Going away into the Marines made him harder and more unapproachable to people who didn’t know him.
Dallas was a private man who had been fighting some demons from his time in the service. Dalton knew that his sibling had lost his entire squadron when he had been deployed. It had fucked Dallas up mentally, and he had blamed himself all these years, but then he’d met Candi, and she’d helped him. Dalton would be forever grateful that his sister-in-law was the one to help Dallas out of his personal nightmare.
“Hello to you, too, dear brother.” He chuckled.
Dallas was never one to mince words. He was like a bulldog when something was on his mind. He never let it go.
“I haven’t had a chance to call you. We hooked up this week.” Dalton quickly went over the story of her car dying in front of the station and how they’d reconnected. He left out the steamy details of their night.
There were some things he didn’t share with his sibling.
“And how the hell did you know about Anya?” he asked. It hit him then. He hadn’t even told their parents where his mother could have said something to Dallas.
“She was down here at the station,” Dallas said.
Dalton dropped his feet to the floor. His curiosity was piqued. He knew she’d been hiding something from him, from the rehearsed reason why she was back in Vegas, to the unanswered phone calls and then the nightmare.
“Why would she be down there?” he asked quietly. His chest tightened with anxiety. If she was in trouble, why wouldn’t she say something to him?
“I asked her outright, but she brushed me off with some generic answer. But she failed to remember I am very proficient at getting the answers to my questions.”
Dalton had no doubt his brother was good at extracting information. He was currently leading a gang unit division for the Las Vegas Task Force.
“The officer who helped her owed me a favor. He told me everything.”
Dalton listened to Dallas recount what the officer had told him. An ex-boyfriend. Domestic violence. Trespassing. An arrest was made. Filing an order of protection.
It all made sense.
Why she didn’t want to stay at her apartment.
Why she’d moved back to Vegas.
He glanced down. His hand was trembling. He gripped his knee and blew out a deep breath.
Why hadn’t he pushed her for answers?
She shouldn’t be going through this alone.
“How can we help her?” Dalton cleared his throat. He’d do whatever he needed to keep her safe. He’d just got her in his life, and he was not willing to part from her.
In just a short week, she had burrowed her way into his heart.
He’d known her forever, but this week, he’d really gotten to know Anya, the woman.
“I looked into her ex and called a few buddies down on the Atlanta police force. What they told me wasn’t good, Dalton. This guy is dangerous. He’s a loose cannon and can go off at any time.”
