The Revenge (The Insiders Trilogy #3)(62)

In my head, I was going to dive, grab both, duck my head. I’d complete a full roll, like I’ve seen volleyball players do in their matches. Why I was remembering volleyball matches from high school, I had no clue, but anyway, that’s not what happened.

First, Not Kash slammed his foot down on the radio.

Okay. I’d work with that, because it took him a second away from where he could’ve used that kick to knock me unconscious. Instead, he stepped on the radio and kicked it away.

And two, the gun was still in his holster. I grabbed it, tried to yank it free. It didn’t come free. It remained in the holster.

How did these get free?

But then Not Kash was reaching for me, and that’s when he messed up.

His touch was gentle. That told me he didn’t want to hurt me. I could work with that. So when he went gentle, I became a snarling dirty street fighter. Or I was doing my best impression, because then I finally did finish my roll (just not with the gun or radio), and the movement yanked me out of his hold. But instead of scrambling and running, I twisted around and went for his ankle.

I was the personification of an ankle biter.

I bit his ankle. Literally.

“Fuck,” he growled, then he grabbed my hair and I was being yanked away.

He was fast losing the whole “gentle” approach, but he didn’t pull me to my feet, and I used that to my advantage, too. I kicked out at his legs, and the movement helped propel me out of his hold again. But then I was on my butt and he was looming over me.

I was out of options.

Our eyes met, and I opened my mouth.

Another scream was coming out of me.

He knew it. I knew it. We were both about to hear it.

But then he lunged, grabbed me, dragged me up, and I was pushed against the wall.

Déjà vu. For the third freaking time.

His hand slammed over my mouth, and he bent low, whispering into my ear, “Shut up!”

Except I wasn’t hearing that. I was hearing, “In two minutes, men will break into your home and take you hostage.”

It was his height.

It was his eyes.

It was his voice, now that it was more rough and he wasn’t trying to disguise it.

There was a sixth sense where you shouldn’t know but you just do. You just know it, and that feeling was inside of me. I knew this guy.

My lungs stopped working.

Everything stopped working .

Recognition crashed into me, overloading my everything, and I swear I heard the circuit breakers in my brain frizz and snap as they stopped working, too.

I knew this guy. I so knew him, and I had known I knew him, and I stopped thinking about what I was doing. I slapped his hand away, grabbed his shirt, and hissed, “I know you!”

Articulate genius, I never claimed to be.

His eyes widened, but I was still going. “It was you! You’re Chase.”

“You got the upstairs, right, Chase?”

Arcane team member Chase. Chase who broke into my house, told me he was supposed to rape me and I was about to be kidnapped. That Chase!

“He better have, or was the two pumps not long enough?”

Their sick laughter. I was hearing it all over again.

I was back in my house.

I was arching my back and screaming, “Aahhh!” A breath. “Heeelp me!”

He went still, staring at me. It was like I had captured him and he was being held hostage. Then, “Shit” slipped from him.

Shit?

Shit!

Shit?

I frowned. “What do you mean, ‘shit’?”

A door opened down the hallway. The nightclub’s music blared loud, and someone said “Hey!”

Not Kash/Definitely Chase cursed again, but the door was pushed wider and we heard more shouting, then a stampede was happening, and all the hallway lights were switched on, and he was gone.

I mean, it didn’t happen just like that. He didn’t vanish.

His whole face pinched in on itself. He took two steps back, grabbed the door, opened the door, and was out the door. The SUV’s back door was shoved open and I surged forward .

I had to see. I had to see.

I saw—and my lungs seized.

They stopped working, too, because there was no way.

I was seeing a ghost.

Chrissy Hayes was staring right at me, and there wasn’t a flicker of recognition on her face.

My mother was alive.





THIRTY-EIGHT

Bailey


“Bailey!”

Kash was there and his arms were around me, and he was carrying me back inside the club.

It was pandemonium all around me. Guards were running outside. Kash’s arms were tight around me, but he was barking orders at the same time. Guards were sent to every exit. Every floor. Every room. They were checking the entire club, and then checking the perimeter around the club. I knew all this, heard all this, because Kash refused to let me go.

We were in the stairwell.

Kash was bounding up them, two at a time, still with me in his arms. He was carrying me like I was a baby, and then we were in his office. He laid me back down right where the imposter had woken me. I kept that to myself, knowing Kash would further lose it.

So I sat, and I waited.

Fitz ran in, took Kash aside.

“What the fuck happened out there?” Kash growled.