Colters' Gift (Colters' Legacy #5)(10)

“Jesus,” Noah muttered. “And you wouldn’t tell us about him, why?”

Liam didn’t like the darkness in Lauren’s eyes or the knowledge that whatever pushed her to that final decision must have been bad. He wanted to ask her what the hell the bastard had done to make her finally snap, but now wasn’t the time. She was tortured enough relating what she was. But Liam wouldn’t forget. He’d find out exactly what had happened to push her over the edge. And he knew he damn well wasn’t going to like her answer.

She sucked in a deep breath, almost as if she were trying to hold on to the last thread of her control. Liam sent Noah a dark look, silently telling him to back off, but Noah’s lips were set into a fine line. He was well and truly pissed off now. Not at Lauren, but at Joel Knight.

“I heard the things he said to the woman he hurt and to Ron, his enforcer. What I never realized is that Ron is sent in to fix situations so that Joel doesn’t have to get his hands dirty. Except Joel wanted to set an example of this woman. He wanted to scare her, and so he handled it himself. He has cops on his payroll. He didn’t say who. But he taunted the woman with the fact that if she went to the cops, nothing would happen because she was just a whore nobody cared about and he had enough people on his payroll to make any problem go away.”

Her voice had lowered to a whisper, and a tear slid down her soft cheek. Liam reached up to wipe it away and she flinched away from him. Not in fear, but in shame. It bothered her that she’d cry in front of them.

Rage made his hand shake and he pulled it away so it wouldn’t upset her more.

“He talked about ‘others’ he’d had taken care of. So I knew when I finally got the courage to call Max for help that I couldn’t tell him the truth. And then he called in you two, and it got so complicated. Max wanted to swear out a warrant. He wanted to punish whoever hurt me.”

“Understandably so,” Noah said tightly.

“And let Joel murder my brother?” she asked in horror. “Or you and Liam? How is that supposed to make anything better? How would I be able to live with myself knowing that I got one of you killed? I’ve made stupid decisions, but wanting to keep my brother and you two alive isn’t one of them.”

Liam sighed. There was no way for him and Noah to win this argument or sway her from the belief that she’d done the right thing. He wanted to shake her, but that didn’t solve anything.

He wanted to ask her why the hell she ever got involved with Knight anyway. What on earth could she possibly have seen in the smarmy ass**le?

Before leaving New York City, they’d pulled Knight’s record. Squeaky-clean. Not even a parking ticket. Which would certainly lend credence to Lauren’s assertion that he had influential people on his payroll.

He made frequent donations to charity. Hosted political fundraisers, though he never officially allied himself with either the Democratic or Republican Parties. He was more into causes. Causes that elevated his own profile and made him look like the all-American good guy. Hell, looking at his merits, he had all the traits of someone looking to get into politics himself.

And wouldn’t Lauren be one hell of a skeleton in the man’s closet come election time?

That scared the hell out of Liam. If politics were in this guy’s future, it would give him even more motivation to silence Lauren so she was never a thorn in his side.

“Lauren—”

Before he could get out what he was going to say, there was a loud knock on the door. Followed by a guy’s bellow.

“Lauren! Open up. It’s Seth. Are you okay? If you don’t answer in thirty seconds, I’m coming in.”

Lauren scrambled to her feet. Noah and Liam were instantly on guard. Noah was already reaching for his gun while Lauren made a mad dash for the door.

She threw it open and before she could say a word, she was yanked out the door and shoved behind a man wearing a policeman’s uniform.

Gun up in one hand, the other pushing Lauren farther behind him, the cop advanced into the room.

“Put your weapons down and your hands up where I can see them,” the cop snarled. “Don’t give me any reason to shoot.”

“Seth, listen to me,” Lauren pleaded. “They aren’t here to hurt me.”

Seth held up a hand to silence Lauren.

“Who the hell are you and what are you doing in Lauren’s apartment? And you better damn well have a permit to carry those guns, otherwise you’ll be spending the night in my jail. If you so much as laid one finger on Lauren, I’ll make sure I lose the damn key.”

“Whoa, dude, you need to chill out and listen to what Lauren’s trying to tell you,” Noah said, even as he carefully set the gun down on the coffee table.

“Hands up,” Seth barked.

Noah complied and Liam tossed his weapon onto the floor, then carefully raised his hands up and laced his fingers behind his head.

Seth slowly advanced, his gun never lowering and his gaze never moving from Liam and Noah. When he was close enough to get to the weapons Liam and Noah had discarded, he bent carefully and retrieved them. Then he motioned for Liam to move to the couch where Noah stood.

“Sit down. Both of you.”

Liam blew out an exasperated breath. Damn it, they didn’t have time for this shit.

Seth backed toward the door where Lauren still stood, wide-eyed, taking it all in.