Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 100086 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 334(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100086 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 334(@300wpm)
Olivia threw on a sweatshirt over her tank top and padded down the hallway to the room her daughter slept in. She pushed open the door. At first, relief nearly sent her to her knees. There Hadley was, all cuddled up under her blanket like she preferred to sleep. Way to overreact, idiot. She almost turned around and let her daughter keep sleeping, but something made her walk over and look into the portable crib. She tugged down the blanket, frowned, and tugged it down further.
It took entirely too long for her tired mind to understand what she was seeing.
A pillow.
She picked the pillow up, half-sure that somehow she’d missed something and Hadley had snuggled down beneath it, but there was nothing below it except more blankets. Frantic now, Olivia stood and tore the blankets off the bed itself, as if her daughter had somehow climbed out of the crib and fallen asleep somewhere else. She has to be here, she has to be.
Nothing.
“Hadley?” She just escaped her crib. She’s done it before. She’s in the house. I just have to find her. “Hadley! Come out, baby girl, you’re scaring Mama.” She nearly ran over Cillian as she rushed out into the hallway. “I can’t find Hadley.”
He didn’t waste time with cold comfort or telling her that she must be mistaken. He just nodded. “We’ll find her.”
They tore the house apart looking for her, every second that passed solidifying the horrific truth in Olivia’s mind. Hadley is gone. My baby girl is gone. She opened the front door.
And screamed.
Instantly, Cillian was by her side. He pulled her against him, burying her face in his chest. “Don’t look, sweetheart.”
But it was too late. She already had the image of the dead man imprinted on the back of her eyelids. So much blood. The panic she’d been mostly able to hold at bay rose up and punched her in the face. Someone killed our guard, and my daughter is gone. “Hadley—”
He led her into the living room and guided her down onto the couch. “Listen to me, Olivia. Are you listening?”
It was harder than it should have been to focus on his face. “I’m listening.”
“I need to check on the other men.”
He thinks he’s going to find more bodies. “But—”
“I’m not leaving you here alone.” He squeezed her hands, his touch gentle despite the command in his voice. Though part of her wanted to argue that she wasn’t helpless, the rest was trying to come to terms with the fact that her daughter was gone. Someone had come in here, killed at least one person, and taken Hadley.
Fear and panic crystallized inside her, morphing into rage between one breath and the next. They took my baby girl. I’m going to kill them. “It was Dmitri.”
Cillian’s expression didn’t change. “Get what you need. We won’t be returning.”
“Okay.”
She followed him upstairs, eerie calm settling around her. Dmitri might have threatened to do just this, but a naive part of her had assumed that he wouldn’t follow through on it. Not like this. Not without warning. Not in the middle of the night and killing at least one person along the way. She changed into a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and her boots, conscious of Cillian standing between her and the doorway, his dark eyes narrowed as if he expected an attack at any moment. She could have told him it was no use, that Hadley was gone, but she’d obviously been wrong about the lengths Sergei and Dmitri would go to before, so she might be wrong about this, too. Olivia repacked her bag, her hands lingering over Hadley’s clothes. I’m getting you back, baby girl. Just hang in there. Mama’s coming.
“You got everything?”
She looked around the room, part of her hoping that this was all a mistake and that her daughter would appear with an infectious giggle. But it wasn’t a mistake, and she didn’t appear. Olivia stood on shaking legs and forced herself to nod. “Yes.”
She must have been more out of it than she realized, because Cillian had managed to dress in one of his suits and pack his own bag while she was working on hers. He pulled her into his arms and hugged her so tightly, it was as if he was afraid she’d break apart into a million pieces. “We will get her back.”
“Cillian—”
“We will get her back, Olivia.” He pressed a kiss to her temple and stepped back. “Stay close.”
He didn’t take her hand, and she belatedly realized it was so he could be free to draw the gun she could see in the shoulder holster. The similarities between Cillian and Dmitri were never more pronounced than in that moment with that deadly glint in his eyes. This was not the man who made love to her last night and told her he had no intention of letting her go. This was Cillian O’Malley, a man who’d seen unfathomable loss in his life, a man deadly in his own right.