“She left her purse behind,” Asshole said, averting his eyes. “She was kind of in a hurry.”
She’d left her purse behind because she was eager to get away from him.
Ty’s hands tightened around her. “Gemma? Gemma, stay with me. Someone get my kit. I might have to trach her.”
Tracheotomy. Ty might have to put a hole in her throat and shove a tube in it so she could breathe.
Ty looked up, his eyes lighting with hope when he saw Cade. “Cade? Cade, get down here and help me.”
He felt like time sped up again. He’d been locked into place, but this was happening and he couldn’t hesitate. Ty seemed to think it was okay, so he could touch her, let her know he was there. She needed him. He dropped to his knees and put his hands on her. No matter what she looked like, she was his Gemma. She was beautiful.
Gemma’s eyes, her beautiful blue eyes were little slits. Her whole face was swollen. She turned toward his, her hand coming out. Red blotches covered her perfect skin. Gemma gripped his hand.
It killed him to see her this way. She always seemed larger than life, like nothing could really touch her, like she was deep down stronger than the world around her. But he was reminded that she was just human. She was just a woman who needed someone to coddle and protect her.
“Baby, baby, stay with me.” He’d sent her off with this fucker who hadn’t taken care of her. He’d done this. He was going to lose her, too. He would hold her hand and she would slip away. She would join the others. Tears blurred his eyes. Stay with me. Stay with me.
“What the hell?” Stella’s voice rang out. Her boots sounded across the floor as she ran. “Oh, god. Is that Gemma? Hal!”
“Someone needs to get my fucking kit.” Ty held his keys out. “This is serious. If I can’t get her breathing in two minutes, she’s going to die. She needs some fucking epinephrine.”
Asshole Lawyer just stood there, looking around like he was waiting for a servant to show. Beth McNamara plucked the keys out of his hand and took off running.
Stella yelled back to the kitchen, but everything was an incomprehensible mess to his ears. Blood pounded through his system. His vision shifted down to just one thing. Gemma’s eyes. They were so small when they were always so big to him. Those eyes that watched him with mocking affection seemed to shrink, her flesh crowding them out. As he watched, they closed, the poison in her system shutting everything down.
He would go down with her. He would walk out and be done. The Rio Grande was minutes away. The river had always wanted him. It was where he belonged. When Gemma was gone, he would find her again there. It would be easy. The easiest thing he’d ever done.
Hal ran out, a small object in his hand. His knees hit the floor. “I have an EpiPen! We got it when Gemma started working here. We wanted to make sure she was safe.”
Ty took the small syringe and had it in her leg before Cade could take another breath.
The door to the diner opened, and Caleb Burke ran in, Hope following behind him. “What the hell’s going on? Where’s my patient?”
Gemma breathed, her chest moving in a shallow but sweet symphony of life.
Ty put his head down, his breath sawing in and out like he’d just run a marathon. He moved away, his back against a booth. “She’s allergic to strawberries. Hyper allergy by the looks of it. She’s had a dose of epinephrine. Her pulse was thready but steady now. She’s all yours, Doc.”
Caleb Burke started looking at his patient. Cade took a long breath, forcing himself not to cry. Never once, even when death had seemed imminent, had she let go of his hand. Cade held on to hers, gently though he wanted to squeeze tight. Anything to try to keep her here with him.
“Wow. She still looks horrible. When will that go away?” Asshole stared down at her.
And Cade lost it.
Chapter Thirteen
Jesse looked down at the letters Cam laid out in front of him. They were protected by plastic evidence bags, but it was easy to read the typewritten letters—and way too easy to see the intent behind them.
“Has she gotten letters like this before?” He had to check himself. What he wanted to do was beat the shit out of someone, anyone. It would make him feel better. Maybe not anyone. Maybe Patrick Welch, who had run off with his girl. Yeah, that would really make him feel better. Patrick came from that world. From the world that had brought this crazy man into her life.
Nate sat down at the table in the interrogation room. He stared down at the letters, his brown eyes shrewd. Despite the fact that he was now the sheriff to a tiny county, Jesse heard he’d spent years undercover with the DEA. When Nate Wright’s eyes got that steely gaze in them, Jesse could damn well believe that was true.
“Apparently it’s a job hazard in her former occupation.” Nate nodded toward the door as Cam walked in with Rafe Kincaid and Laura Niles.
Rafe looked down at Jesse, a rueful smile on his face. “I wanted to tell you. I think the whole ‘getting in her pants’ thing is overrated. If you care about a woman, you care about her whether or not you’re sleeping with her.”
Laura’s lips turned up in a little smile as she sat down beside Jesse. “I heard Rafe was outvoted. The rumor is the men all got together a couple of months back and banged out an agreement on how to act. I would love to get my hands on a copy of that agreement.”
Cam huffed out a little laugh. “Rumors. Do you honestly believe if the men of Bliss got together for a guy’s weekend, we would do anything other than drink beer and fish? Well, except for Trev. He drank a lot of coffee and sat around with that perpetual look of amusement he has on his face. I swear that man’s blood count must be half caffeine.”
Rafe’s shoulders moved up and down in a negligent shrug. “Besides, if we did have some sort of agreement, we would never be so foolish as to write it down. We would memorize it.”
Nate reached for his coffee mug and grimaced. “Cam made the coffee this morning. I was kind of hoping Gemma would come in with you. She’s the only one who can work that thing. Is she with Cade? Tell me you weren’t too hard on her.”
He didn’t think he’d been hard at all. He’d cajoled her into admitting she belonged to him and then he’d given her a crazy strong orgasm and explained just how easily she could get out of her punishment. He’d been a total pussy. He should have immediately put her over his knee, but he’d wanted things to go easy with her. “She left. Her ex showed up and she took off.”
“She’ll come back. She’s not a girl to just up and run without a really good reason. I would also be very surprised if she got involved with her ex again. I heard what he did to her. She would be far more interested in her old career than in reclaiming him,” Laura said.
That career shit scared the crap out of him. He agreed with Laura. Gemma had seen an opportunity to make a point and she’d taken it. But why was that asshole here in the first place? Jesse had to hope Patrick was trying to win her back. That wouldn’t work. If he’d come to talk to her about going back to work? That was another story entirely.
Nate groaned a little and scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Yeah, well, Bliss rules or not, I shouldn’t talk to you about this at all without Gemma here. I’m going to because I think Gemma overestimates her ability to take care of herself. Now, Rafe and Laura and Cam have been working up some ideas about this guy.”
Jesse didn’t care about ideas. “Do you have a name?”
“Paul Johnson. Before you hop on your Harley for some of that vigilante justice you and Cade seem to like so much, you should know we’ve already tried to locate him. The last report we could find had him living in Kansas City two years back,” Nate explained.