Page 43

“Royal is just fine,” he replied. “I’m getting off this call. Don’t come by unless one of you is missing a limb or shot. And I mean life-threatening shot, no flesh wounds.”

The call disconnected, and a second later, Jinx’s voice returned. “Okay, he doesn’t like to admit it, but he prefers to be kept up to speed when we’re going into a messy situation. And now for the messy situation.”

They went over the plan one last time, even though they had repeated it over and over throughout the day. The only time Hanna’s mind hadn’t been on the premeditated B&E had been when she had spoken with Jinx about the leak in her department. One by one, they were going down the line of the people she worked with, people who had access to restricted files, and eyes and ears within the office. Hanna hadn’t put official records about Grace anywhere she didn’t trust, but the safe house was in the database, if a person knew where to look.

She didn’t like it, digging into their personal lives, the lives of people who had quite literally had her six more times than she could count, but until she knew who was behind the location sharing, she couldn’t be certain at all that her department was safe or reliable.

“We’ll be waiting,” Gray said over the comms. “See you all on the other side of this.”

Hopefully they would. Hopefully, Grace would be in her bedroom at her husband’s home, just waiting for their rescue, shaken but otherwise unharmed.

And hopefully my sister will walk through the door happy and alive as the last day I saw her.

“Han, I still think you should sit this one out,” Ash muttered. He stood from the table and started pacing around the small living room. “If you get caught…”

“If I get caught, that’s on me,” Hanna said. “It’s not any better if any of you get caught, either. We only have one chance at this, and I’m not going to sit on the sidelines while all of you risk getting hurt.”

Because, for better or for worse, she was coming to care for these men. Gray, Xander and Jinx were putting themselves into the line of fire because it was the right thing to do, no other reason. Nicco and Ash, well, that went a whole lot deeper for many more complicated reasons.

“Hanna…”

Hanna stood. “Enough, Ash. I don’t know why you think you have any control over my life. I need help saving a woman I promised to protect, and that is the only reason I called you here. You keep telling me you don’t see me as your sister, and that’s fine, but stop treating me like a child.”

Ash stood too, his height imposing, the dark look on his face even more imposing. “Then stop acting like one. Hanna, Jesus Christ, your badge isn’t going to keep you safe right now. Your bravado, your hellfire, it’s not going to protect you from a goddamned bullet.”

“And what about you?” Her hands were on her hips before she could stop herself, her feet inching forward to him, as if they were pulled by invisible strings back to each other again and again. “What’s going to keep you safe, Ash?”

“It’s not the same,” he bit out.

Hanna let out a harsh laugh. Now was so not the time for them to be dredging up the past, but fuck if she could help herself. She found she had a very difficult time controlling herself when Ash was involved.

In every way that mattered.

“How, Ash?” Her tone was dark. “How is it any different if you get hurt?”

“Because I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you.” His words were so quiet she barely heard them, but their meaning was all too terribly clear.

Hanna turned on her heel, trying to swallow the wash of pain and want and confusion roiling inside her. “You left.”

Her eyes crinkled at the corners, hot pressure swelling, the threat of angry tears she wouldn’t be able to stem for long. “Ash, you left me. A lifetime ago. I… I tried to find you, but you ran and hid.” The confession, for what else could it be with the way the words tangled in her throat, nearly choked her. “You can’t come in and play this part when you never wanted to be in my life.”

Ash stepped forward, and God, she hated how much she wanted to go to him, how after all these years he was still the one that felt like home. He hadn’t just broken her heart when he’d left, he detonated a bomb in the last solid structure in her life, shaking the very foundation of what she had known about herself, about family. About love.

Teen love. Puppy love. Nothing more than that. But at seventeen, everything had felt bigger.

“I’m surprised it took you this long to bring it up,” Ash muttered, and there was a note of true regret in his voice that she wasn’t going to let trip her up. She wasn’t. “Kind of expected it out of the gate.”

Hanna released a deep, shuddering sigh. “I kind of thought I was over it.”

He bit his lip. “You’re not.”

Hanna thought back, way back, to the final conversation she’d heard Ash share in that very kitchen. To the way it felt like her world had tilted on its axis, throwing her around and around until she was sure she would never see straight again.

“My father offered you money to leave me.” She would not get choked up. She would not. More than a decade had passed since that day.

So why does it still feel like a fresh wound?

“And you took it, Ash. You took it.”